


Average Jo(e)

by TheYeeteor (Greeneggsyeet)



Series: Average Jo(e) [1]
Category: Penguins of Madagascar
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-25
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-08 22:14:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 44,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27183670
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Greeneggsyeet/pseuds/TheYeeteor
Summary: It's obvious when something seems fishy, especially a penguin without records. When the team makes room for one more man, she has to learn what it really means to be a penguin. How long does it take a dream to turn into a nightmare?- Now includes accompanying illustrations!Story is complete, but one-shots and chapter inserts are planned along with future fics to explore PoM's canon and lore.
Series: Average Jo(e) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2161173
Comments: 19
Kudos: 21





	1. Falling in Line

The world felt different, as though everything had been put on hold. It wasn't just the world that felt different, either. 

She didn't recognize this long orange beak, black appendages that felt so weird to use as she curled them and bent her flippers. It was only a matter of time before the landscape caught her attention. As she walked around slapping her webbed feet, she spotted tall skyscrapers and architecture she remembered from the Central Park Zoo. Now, she had a faint idea where she was, but not much else as a strange mental fog kicked in.

Without consideration for who might hear her loud walking, to her right the grating sound of a metal hatch disguised as a feeding bowl caught her attention. Out peeped a penguin head, disgruntled from a morning routine thrown out of whack.

"What in the name of Scarlet O'Hara is going on up here?" The chubby penguin plooped up onto the concrete plateau, and two others followed. They were much taller, one had a rounder head, and the other's ruffled and scarred.

"Skipper, It appears there is a new penguin addition to our habitat." They remained in their combative stances as the short and flat one put his flippers on his sides to scrutinize the sudden new penguin arrival.

"Last time I checked there were no incoming crates. Wouldn't we have known about this months ago?" He narrowed his eyes to glare at the suspicious new penguin.

"Grup -yap yap. Hhhuught-" The wild looking penguin heaved up a flamethrower and aimed it at the newcomer.

"Woah now, Rico, stand down!" He put a flipper to the crazed one's chest. "We don't yet know if this is a friend… or a foe."

"It's true. Come to think of it we haven't met a penguin that wasn't cute or cuddly." The intelligent one slinked out of his combat pose as he looked from the leader to the strange one across the way.

"You, newbie. State your name and business." His flipper moved from Rico's chest to point at her.

The woman hesitated before opening her beak, still wondering why it felt so out of place.

"I'm Jo-"

"Joe as in foe?" The leader reinvigorated his fighting stance.

"No! Jo as in-"

"As in-filtrating our headquarters!?"

She snapped her beak shut and looked from the leader, to the nutcase, and then finally to the only one who had said any sensible thing yet. He darted his eyes back to the pair next to him, then to the new penguin.

"Skipper, I really don't think it is necessary to intimidate another penguin. After all, birds of a feather…?"

"Oooh. The 18th amendment to the penguin credo. Kowalski, what would I do without you?" Skipper eased his stance and put his flippers behind his back to puff up in response.

"Spontaneously combust, or destroy the coffee maker, or commit several war crimes, or-" The tall and rounded bird received a quick slap.

"That was a rhetorical question."

"Alright Joe, for the time being you're bunking with us." He leaned forward a bit, looking the oddball up and down. Rico gulped his weaponry down again, smiling from Skipper to the new member.

"Yeah! Joe!" He spoke in a gruff holler, nodding his head as his scarred beak bobbed.

"Skipper, would this make Joe the newest private recruit?" Kowalski posed the question to his leader.

"Huh, yeah, good thing Private is already private first class. Maybe we will need to give him a new nickname, like Classy, or Firstly." The pair next to him exchanged a look of 'that sounds like a horrid idea' while they thought their leader wasn't looking. "Speaking of, where is the young Private?"

As Private fell out of bed, the soft thud of his chubby form landing was accompanied by a British grunt. The slippy slaps his feet made on the concrete below became clearer and less distant, turning into metal chimes as he climbed the ladder. After a moment, a groggy round short penguin peeps up as the three above ground look down at him.

"Aye Skipper, I'm here." He saluted for a moment before taking notice of the other penguin. With a smol gasp he spoke again. "Another penguin!"

As he became more awake, Private jumped up, waddling quickly to offer a flipper shake. "Hello! It's nice to meet you!"

"Oh, hi!" She reached out, taking the shorter penguin's flipper and awkwardly trying to shake as if they had hands. "I'm Joa-"

"-and he is our newest private recruit." Skipper finished her sentence, as Private looked back in awe.

"So we will call him Joe since I'm Private?" They had this problem in the past, when Mort was instigated as a private recruit for a mission, and this time Private was getting it squared away.

"It's been a while since you've been promoted. Not to mention you have proven yourself as an important and valued member of the team… It's time you became corporeal."

"-Corporal" Kowalski interjected to correct the mistake.

"Wha-great news! I'm a Corporal now!" Private hugged the stranger. She hugged him back, happily. It was the best hug she had received in a long time. He was adorable, and his blubbery chubbiness made the hug so soft and warm. "Oh thank you thank you thank you!"

As Private pulled away, the new penguin pulled her flippers up close to her chest.

"We'll still call you Private. Corporal will be implied just like the first class used to be." Private stopped hugging the stranger, smiling as he nodded back to his Skipper.

"Aye sir!" He saluted heartily.

"Alright men, time to get back to work." Skipper was happy for the celebrations, but needed to stay firm to show the new recruit that R&R was earned and not given away frivolously. For her, she wanted to clear up a major misconception quickly.

"Actually, I'm a-"

"-Astonished at how fast we can get back to our stations?" She looked at the short cocky bird, a bit miffed that her important revelation had repeatedly been interrupted.

"No, what I'm trying to say is that you've got it wrong! I'm a g-" In an instant, she was alarmed to be slapped across the face. Standing before her now was an angered Skipper.

"There are two things you will learn very quickly if you are going to become a part of our team. As the leader of an elite, feathered task force I must be given due respect. 'No' should seldom leave your beak, and I am never wrong."

Skipper was lucky Kowalski was not there to make the correction that he is not wrong most of the time… She felt her cheeks burn underneath the new sensation of tightly packed feathers that radiated from her beak.

"What? Have you never had any military training?" She shook her head. "Fine, first lesson. After being addressed by anyone on the team -especially me- you should salute and say 'yes sir' with gusto."

"Yes sir!" She quickly put her right flipper up to her forehead, puffing out her chest and looking down at her new commander.

He pinched the bridge of his beak with a sigh before correcting her wings from a right flipper salute to a left flipper salute, and she felt like a complete buffoon.

"PRIVATE!" Skipper barked down towards the latch, and within a few moments this time the small round penguin arrived for duty.

"Sir!" He saluted.

"I want you to show Joe around, give him the ropes, and make sure he is up to speed in case of sudden missions." In a moment he leaned in, covering his beak with a flipper while speaking at the same volume. "With the element of surprise, test his combat training. I want to make sure he can fight like one of us and not some little girl."

It was hard to tell whether the gesture was a joke or if he really thought just putting a flipper up would prevent his voice from carrying. Private replied with a nod before the pair returned to looking at her.

"Well, I'm off to finish my morning routine." Skipper checked an oversized clock device Kowalski had made for him. "Blast! I'm 30 minutes off schedule!" He nodded to Private before slooping back through the hatch.

Now out in the open as the other three were sealed below, Private giddily turned to her with a big smile and a giggle.

"Its so wonderful to have a new penguin recruit!" Private bounced and radiated joy. "Alright, Joe! It's the perfect time to show you around the outer habitat. That hatch is what Alice thinks is just our food bowl. I'll show you the feeding times when we get to the big schedule downstairs."

"Yes sir!" She saluted, just to be on the safe side of respect. Private beamed at the taller penguin.

"That's the first time I have ever been called sir!" The smol bean bounced up and down at her.

He was adorable, but she resisted smiling after the wake up call from Skipper earlier.

"Oh, come now, you don't need to be a stick in the mud all the time." Private nudged her arm. "How about an ice-breaker? Follow me!" He glided on his belly off the side farthest from the front of the enclosure and splashed into the water.

For the first time, she was alone since arriving from wherever she had come from. It slipped her mind, now, as she quickly gained her sea legs -er, webbed feet. Following Private's lead, she dove on her belly, and was immediately astounded at how smoothly the oily feathers allowed her to glide. With a bit too much momentum, she slid across and slapped into the side of the small pool that created a moat around their habitat.

"Golly, are you aright?" Private put on his cockney accent as she resurfaced, realizing quickly how to steer her feet like little rudders.

"I'm fine, just trying to get my bearings. Been a while since I was… swimming." She loved the water but for so long hadn't had any opportunity to just dive in.

"Don't worry, I can only imagine how long you must have been cooped up while being delivered here."

She had been cooped up, but being in the water felt so free. Her new big webbed feet gave her precision after eons of design for use underwater. Resurfacing, she had trouble recalling much of the details about her mysterious arrival. Still, she knew that it wasn't a delivery from a crate.

"Cooped up for sure." In the moments afterward, the pair started a gentle lap around the small fenced in island, the early morning sun barely shining on any of the plaster and painted snow. Real snow would have had a blue effect to the surroundings, and she missed that refracted light effect. 

"Don't be so glum! When Alice isn't around we can go wherever we want to." Private had noticed the other penguin sadly examining the surrounding enclosure. "Plus, the Central Park Zoo is one of the better ones to be in!"

She smiled at Private, before continuing to float in the lukewarm water. Below, she could make out the observation windows for zoo patrons to observe the animals and watch them swimming. Private was about to speak up when a deep, muffled explosion interrupted.

"Crikey! That's no good." He dove to porpoise out of the water, and she did her best to follow suit. 


	2. A Penguin's Purpose

Private opened the hatch, then stepped aside to allow the newest recruit in first. She started climbing down the makeshift ladder, and heard the door shut above her as the full base came into view. There were crypt-like bunkbeds on the side of the wall, and a large TV that seemed familiar.

As she and Private plopped chubbily to the ground from the ladder rungs, the smoke from the explosion cleared to reveal a fifth slot carved into the wall to the right of the top bunks. Rico tasted the thick air and nodded.

"Good work Rico! There's a reason why you're our one-and-only demolitions expert." Skipper gave the taller flat-headed penguin a hearty plap on the back. Kowalski felt around the edges of the blast and took out a measuring compass.

"I still don't know how you manage to attain these perfect 90 degree angles with such a turbulent force." The smartest one backed off, glancing worriedly at the others. Skipper rolled his eyes at the scientist.

"Details which would get in the way of work getting done."

"-Done with."

"Gazoontight." The leader swirled a fish in his coffee mug before sipping it sternly.

In the pause between all the commotion Private and Jo had just witnessed, the Corporal turned to face her.

"Wow, you already have your own slot in the wall! I was wondering if we were all going to take turns sharing." Private giggled at the thought. "Still, you're right next to me, and that's going to be wonderful, I just know it!"

She nodded, happily, while Rico coughed up a fluffy pillow that shot directly into the new bed. Then, he dry heaved a few times before shaking his head sadly.

"All out of blankets." Skipper put a flipper to the bottom of his beak in thought. "They are just for show, we don't need blankets with our natural insulation."

"Correct. Our thick interlacing feathers block out the cold as well as using a lipid layer that works to protect our core heat in subarctic temperatures." Kowalski smiled as he looked down at Skipper. "Of course some of us have a few extra layers of subcutaneous fat that-"

Skipper slapped the bird brain.

"That should be considered a compliment!" Kowalski sighed, taking out a clipboard to secretly write a new mark in a tally chart for slaps that ranked the team members using the number of slaps per hour.

"I" The new member spoke up, causing all four of the others to stare back in anticipation of what she had to say. "I… think, that I will be fine either way." It was nerve-wracking as the others had been constantly cutting off anything she had to say, and now she second guessed herself when speaking.

"I'm sure it will all work out, now hows about we finish the tour of headquarters?" Private broke the awkward pause with his cute interjection. The other three stepped back as Private led Jo around the compound. "Over here is the telly, and we have a selection of movies from shirtless ninja warriors to monster truck demolition and even a few er, documentaries…"

"Oh, do you have any documentaries narrated by David Attenborough?" She looked at the selection, finding all of the options enjoyable, but by far her favorite was nature documentaries.

"Who?" Private seemed a little kerfuffle, not understanding how a penguin could enjoy documentaries. Well, a penguin besides Rico, but to him Joe didn't seem _that_ unchained. Should he be worried?

"He's a nature scientist, and spent his life dedicated to researching about flora and fauna around the world." She beamed at Private, as he hesitantly looked back at Kowalski, who gave him a small shrug.

"Well, there is still a lot more to see!" Politely switching topics, the round penguin led her to the podium where various buttons glowed. Pressing a few he was able to bring down the giant calendar that Skipper kept suspended in the main room.

"It still seems suspicious to me that we didn't have any intel on you being shipped here." The short and flat-headed commander put his hands on his hips as his brow furrowed.

Both Kowalski and Jo opened their beaks to start giving explanations, but the pair were cut off by Rico yowling.

"Alice!" He tapped the feeding chart and pointed to the clock. As Skipper jumped to the periscope to confirm the zookeeper's position, the other three rushed up the ladder in preparation for the feeding frenzy.

As Skipper followed the others, Jo was left alone down in the headquarters wondering if her presence was unaccounted for in the Zoo. Meanwhile, the four original members of the team were too focused on the feast to notice the new recruit missing.

When the hatch creaked back open, Kowalski was the first to come down, and he looked at Jo with a questioning tilt to his head as the others came down and made the same realization.

"You don't know our protocol for feeding times…" The scientist spoke with hesitation, as it wasn't really anybody's fault. Still, he felt bad that absence of crucial information had cost the new recruit a meal.

"Oh, it's okay. I don't eat fish anyway."

There was a gasp and the air became still as Rico over-dramatically fainted.

"Don't-eat-fish?" Skipper put his flippers out to his sides and felt his blood boil. "That's insubordination against how mama nature built our entire species and goes against everything we stand for!" Rico got back up to angrily nod in agreement.

With a British cry, Private rushed to put himself between Skipper and the scorned penguin.

"Wait!" He looked at his leader with big eyes and spoke from the heart. "Joe is a member of the team now. We should give him a chance."

"It's true, Skipper. We are all lucky not to have any seafood allergies, but animals born in captivity are susceptible to odd ailments that shouldn't define who they are." With Kowalski's interjection and the hostile way her food preference was met, she meekly spoke up.

"I can… eat Tuna." It wasn't technically lying if she didn't mention not being unable to eat other kinds of seafood.

"Rico!" Skipper turned to the other angry penguin with an extended flipper, and Jo became frightened of what weaponry Skipper was ordering from the other. Flamethrower? Harpoon?

It happened so fast, but the unwieldy penguin regurgitated a tuna, and his dual swords. Chopping it all up in mid-air to make a pyramid of tuna sashimi that landed perfectly in front of her.

She timidly ate the food, noting how oddly delicious it was even as she tried to ignore where it came from. It was fresh, and in a weird way the warmth was calming.

"Put that allergy intel in Joe's file, so we remember to get extra tuna during our fish heists and separate his rations." As Kowalski quickly noted Skipper's words, she had a bad feeling about that white lie being recorded in a file. Also, the fact they were making a file that might be 90% false at this point didn't sit well either.

"Glad that got sorted out!" Private had waddled back up to her and immediately made that feeling of despair fade away. The others went back to their stations.

"We can pick up the tour where we left off!" In the next while, Jo learned about their most basic protocols so she would know what to do. Skipper took note of how well Private was explaining everything, and felt proud of how much the young one had picked up from them.

Private led her to Kowalski's lab, where he explained how nobody is usually allowed back here but today is an exception. There are a lot of safety protocols that need to be followed, so the inventions are stabilized and brought into the main HQ when completed. Although they usually turn against the group halfway through use, before threatening to destroy life as they know it. Anyway, Private lead the other out of the lab leaving a disgruntled scientist behind.

Skipper winked at the Corporal when they re-entered the main room, a signal to lead Joe somewhere and test his combat reflexes (obviously). Private didn't really understand, and just awkwardly nodded and led Joe to the tunnel leading to the garage. Here, they found Rico hard at work fixing the Barbie car they drive around. There wasn't much to mention, now, except that they would need to give him a driving test at some point.

It was on the way back through the tunnel that Private recalled Skipper's wink and realized what it meant.

"Oh gosh, I forgot to attack you!" The small round bird remarked.

"You what?" Jo stopped walking, attention on alert as she put a bit of distance between herself and Private.

In HQ, Skipper face-flippered while watching the livecam of the tunnel.

"I was supposed to surprise you with a combat test… completely slipped my mind!" Private put his flippers to his beak, wondering what he was going to tell Skipper.

"Yeah!" She eased up, remembering their aside she overheard. Now, she tried to get into a fighting stance. Surprised at how easy it was, it felt like she could use her extra blubber to add power to her chops.

"I won't go easy on you just because you're the new chap!" Private smirked as he started running at her, sliding and landing a blow to her gut.

It hurt less, surprisingly, as she tensed up and the fat that insulated from cold also worked as a protective layer. Were penguins actually made with built in sparring gear? She adjusted her stance, corkscrewing her webbed feet into the ground and the small talons adding to this force as her muscles remembered what she had forgotten.

Private looked at her stance, taking note of how different her fighting style was from theirs. As he came back around, she was able to block his incoming attack as her body became a fluffy and cute brick wall.

She was afraid to move her position. He was so quick as he slipped around the tunnel, but he eased up as it was clear she had been trained before.

"What a neat trick! You'll have to show the others!" Looking back to how she was gripping the ground, he was in awe. She took his cue to stop sparring and looked down at her feet.

"Show the others? Mayb-" Next thing she knew she was skidding on her back before slamming into the tunnel wall.

"Ah ha! Never let your guard down!" Private giggled, recalling how many times the others had done the same to him as he learned.

"Hey! You're not supposed to attack when we aren't sparring!" She took note that the blubber didn't always work to cushion _everything_.

"I had to, otherwise telling Skipper I used the element of surprise would have been a lie!" Private returned his flippers to his beak. "Whats more —you never know what could happen! Think of protocol 37-b!"

It was true, protocol 37-b was indeed all about keeping your guard up and staying vigilant for other mutant squid robots.

"Alright…" She got up slowly, stretching out before receding back into herself. "Skipper is the leader and keeps the schedules and mission information, Kowalski is the invention data expert and scientist, Rico is the cargo and demolitions expert… What do you do?"

"I'm usually the distraction, or the bait depending on the context." He put his flippers behind his back. "I don't really have a set job."

"You're the mediator!" She sclapped her flippers together. "You're the group diplomat."

Private smiled. Others had never been able to put his ability into words, but knowing what his purpose was made him feel substantial.

"How about you, Joe?"

"Hm?"

"What is your skill?" He nodded and leaned in as if he was about to hear a secret. Then, he reeled back. "Not that you have to know right away!"

"I'm an artist." She smiled, her heart knowing her purpose immediately.

"An artist? Like, making pretty pictures?" They had started sauntering back, waddling slowly down the tunnel towards HQ.

"Yes, I make paintings, drawings, and illustrate stories." She got lost in thought, remembering how much she loved making artwork.

"You'll have to show me when we get back!" Private was giddy, it seemed like Joe and he would get along swimmingly.

"I wasn't able to bring anything with me." She felt her heart sink as something more personal seemed to be missing, too.

"Thas allrite!" He nodded. "We have paper and crayons at HQ!"

Crayons and paper at HQ: ┐(;Ծ⌓Ծ;)┌ brrrrrrr

"I suppose that would work…" With a loud grating noise, Private spun the door lock mechanism and led Jo through, back into HQ.


	3. She Wears Many Hats

"Ah gentlemen, welcome back." Skipper sipped coffee nonchalantly, as he raised a brow at Private.

"Actually I-" Jo made one last attempt to clear everything up, but Private interjected this time.

"You were so shocked when I attacked you unexpectedly!" He smiled at Jo, and Skipper rolled his eyes before smiling at Private's antics.

"Yes!" Jo went along with Private.

"Alright, what's the report?" Skipper sipped again, waiting to see what Private would say.

"Joe does have combat training, but it's very different from ours." He nodded. "Show Skipper that stance!" Jo hunkered down, spinning her feet, and using the ground for stability she put her flippers up in a v shape.

"Hot beans and toast!" Skipper came forward, interested as he waddled around the new recruit. "Kowalski, analysis!" The scientist jumped into action, studying the position and stance of the penguin.

"It appears that the friction caused by the feet and legs turned in reverse of each other creates a bond with the ground that reinforces the penguin above!" He stood tall, instinctually knowing to repeat the information 'in English' "In layman's terms…" He started attempting to push Jo over and remained in place because of cartoon physics.

"Great! We can incorporate that into our next training session." Skipper tapped Jo's other shoulder as he came back around to the table in the center of the room.

"Skippah, there's something else. Joe is an artist!" As the three others sat at the table, they looked at Private and Jo for a moment before cracking smiles and exchanging glances.

"I guess he'll be joining the arts and crafts unit of our operation." Skipper nudged Kowalski.

"Oh uh, yeah! Defeating our foes with 'symbolism'" The other added air quotes with the tips of his flippers as the higher ranks made fun of Private and the recruit.

Jo put her flippers up to her chest as an anxious fear came over her. It was then that she heard Private get mad for the first time.

"Enough! You all can make fun of me all you want, but you haven't even given him a chance!" Private pointed a flipper at Kowalski and Rico, hesitating before even pointing it at Skipper.

"Woah now Private, I haven't seen moxie like that since the big hustle of '02." Skipper reminisced, before tapping the side of the table across from him. "Rico, Kowalski, give him the goods."

Rico coughed up a spare clipboard and Kowalski removed a blank sheet of paper from his. With an extra glare from Skipper, the scientist gave Jo his red crayon and pencil to borrow.

Jo nervously came up to sit at the table, gripping the crayon by curling her flipper around it. Something seemed off. She was absolutely certain to have made lots of art before, but the way her flipper trembled made her second guess her dogma.

Still, this was her only chance to prove her skill, and her entire life had been prepping for this moment. A pencil and crayon magnum opus. She had the afterimage of Skipper sitting across from her in her mind, and so that's what she decided to start with.

As she sketched the leader out with the buttery crayon, she then went back over to darken choice lines in pencil, before adding some hints of tone and feather texture with hatch marks. Finally, darkening the major shadows she emphasized the highlight on the beak, and looked at her image in sorrow.

“Its been a long time since I’ve used a crayon, and the lines are wobbly because I am nervous and-“ Skipper put a flipper to her beak.

“Be quiet man. I have to appreciate this.” Skipper darted his head closer to the art, slinking around the table as the others followed. “By jove! You made me look gorgeous!” The other penguins shared a glance.

“Could you… add a hat?” Skipper sheepishly requested it, but Jo felt reinvigorated, so she happily obliged. Doodling on a low cowboy hat, sheadjusted the shadows on the portrait to mirror the new addition. She took pride in getting the textures of feathers, leather, and metal spot-on.

The other penguins were too enamored with the artist to exchange another look about Skipper’s request. A stunned silence washed over the group again, but instead of being uncomfortable it felt proud.

“Alright men, from this day forward no more making fun of artists.” Rico coughed up an Anti-Warhol gag poster and tossed it in the incinerator. Skipper then pointed to Jo with glee. “Give me artistic options!”

She was caught a little off guard, and Kowalski nudged her arm before taking his crayon back to write his thoughts out before listing them off. 

“Criminal description depictions, sprucing up the headquarters, new team portraits…” Kowalski gasped. “Scientific renderings!?” Jo looked up at him with a smile and nodded.

“Yes, scientific illustrations are one of my specialties!” Her smile faded a little as she thought. “Though, I don’t have any of my art supplies or my old studio space…” 

Skipper tapped his flipper in thought. “Kowalski, is there any room in your lab for an art studio?”

“I believe there should be room if I move the reactor core… and perhaps Maurice would be willing to lend some of his art supplies.” 

“Alright, Rico, clear my schedule. Today, we visit _the lemurs_.” As Skipper spoke those words, the world seemed to zoom in on his face for dramatic effect. The demolitions expert slid his flipper on the calendar, smudging the pictoral information with a laugh.

In a flash, the four original team members started bounding out of the hidden base, leaving Jo to waddle and attempt sliding towards the ladder. Still a little heavy on the momentum, she put her flippers on the rungs before her face encountered the metal. Climbing up, she joined the others above in the habitat.

“Close the hatch, man!” Skipper glared at Jo.

“Oh -yes sir!” She almost put her right flipper up again but caught herself. Closing the hatch behind her she noticed how fast it slammed shut. Was it blast-proof?

“Quiet that noise! That hatch is the only thing preventing our cover from being blown, and Alice is already hot on our trail.” He put his flippers on his hips as Kowalski calculated on his abacus.

“At her current rate she will discover our base in 53.8 years.” That was long enough where Jo didn’t think they would need to worry, but better to be safe than sorry she supposed.

“Zoo opens at ten-hundred hours. We need to move.” Skipper signaled for the others to slide and breech over the fence.

Jo did her best to follow, for once the momentum put to good use as she cleared the metal bars of their enclosure. Landing, however, was harder than she thought in more ways than one.

While the others were in a superhero pose, she platted onto the zoo road belly first, knocking the wind out of her.

“That has to smart…” Private rubbed the side of his beak as she got up clutching her gut.

“Still getting my bearings.” At that moment she made a vow to practice the sliding and gliding until she perfected it, avoiding making a fool of herself or enduring any more pain.

“Depending on how long it took you to arrive, your muscles may have started to atrophy…” Kowalski remarked, before Private and Rico gave him a questioning look. “Actually, probably unlikely.”

“Are we going to burn daylight with this chit-chat? Move!” Skipper ordered, the men darting towards the habitat with the giant plastic volcano, bounce castle, and tall throne. Jo hesitated less this time, falling in line as Skipper brought up the lead.

Timing the jump after watching the others ahead of her, she was able to match and land a bit easier. Still on her feet, anyway.

“Hey you guys, what brings you here?” A stocky aye-aye greeted the birdsas he carried a large bundle of fruits. Skipper took note of his uncharacteristically chipper demeanor.

“You’re in an awfully good mood this morning. What gives?”

“King Julien ’s still asleep” He continued struggling to carry the fruit. Skipper pointed and each of his men went to grab a bit to lighten his load. Maurice felt thankful and smiled. “I was just carrying more supplies to the juice bar so if you could- wait a minute, why are you _water fowl_ suddenly helping me?”

“We have a favor to ask of you.” Skipper cut to the chase.

“No way. Not after the last time. I was stuck getting gelatin out of my tail for weeks!” Maurice crossed his arms as Rico and Kowalski shrugged, arms full of mangoes and bananas.

“This time is more of a material favor, not labor. Artist to artist camaraderie. Surely that stands for something.”

“Since when do you birds do _anything_ related to art?” The lemur still wasn’t convinced.

“We have a new member of our team, an artist.” Kowalski nodded to Jo, both birds obscured mostly by the fruit.

As the scene faded from the grass below to the group dropping off the fruit at the juice bar above, Maurice became intrigued hearing about the newcomer and the transpiring events that happened prior.

“I still don’t understand how you didn’t know about this. We get a day or so to know a new crate is comin’ but this? A _penguin_ flew under the radar?”Maurice, unlike the other pair of lemurs, gave the commando unit credit for accurately monitoring the comings and goings of the zoo.

“We still haven’t figured it out yet either.” Skipper ignored the mammals’ flying jab, still needing to secure the favor. “In the meantime, Joe needs art supplies. Could you lend him some?”

Maurice paused for a moment, taking in the request that filled up his rare quiet morning. Looking from Skipper’s stern gaze to Jo, who held her flippers over her chest in anticipation of his answer.

Going behind the bar, he knelt down to press a couple of levers, causing the back of the juice stand to fold out. Revealing a dozen or so portraits of King Julien in various sizes that were homages to renaissance paintings of royalty. There were several tiki themed drawers that slid out to reveal carefully organized art supplies. It was enough to make the penguins intrigued, let alone Jo who was astounded at the range of relatively quality supplies and paintings.

“Take what you need, baby.” He stepped aside, and Jo went up to timidly peruse the array. 

Rico followed her to gulp down the selections. She went through, grabbing some key pigments that she could mix into other colors, and select sized of brushes. There were also some nicer pencils and a few different miscellaneous trays of paint she assumed were watercolor. It was wild to see Rico swallow the sizes of paper and canvas, and she carried some paper by rolling it up after considering how wet it could be inside the other penguin. After a while, Kowalski’s curiosity got the better of him.

“Where did you get all of this?” It seemed strange that the lemurs were able to collect such an amount of contraband with their messy track record of missions and failures.

“The supplies?” Maurice confirmed, “I loot the old bins in lost and found. You’d be surprised how many humans leave their materials at the zoo.”

Jo finished selecting the last item, reassured that she had been thorough and gone through everything to get what she needed. Holding her new paper, she turned to Maurice.

“Thank you so much for letting me use your supplies.” She bowed a bit, showing respect for his act of kindness.

Maurice was about to respond, when a loud accented voice came rushing up behind Jo.

“What is this outrageosity!? If a penguin is to be bowing to a lemur there is only one lemur to be bowing towards!” He raised his arms up in intense anger. “It is obviously to be me!”

Jo spun around as the tall ring-tailed lemur came closer. As he approached, she clutched the paper daintily and cringed away a little.

“Oooh… ~Oh.” In an instant his entire personality switched. Julian quickly counted the number of monochromatic birds. “Maurice, why did you not tell me there was a new lady penguin?”

“Uh, your majesty…” Julien paid no mind to the stagnant awkward air that fell over everyone. Jo was shocked, but oddly relieved that someone had caught on. Was it how she carried the paper?

“Ringtail!” Skipper was already tired of this latest dose of mammalian stupidity, and finally spoke up. “That’s Joe, and _he_ is the newest recruit to our team.”

“I have my kingly ways, and my ways have never been wrong.” He leaned in a bit towards Jo, “Except for that one time.”

“Your majesty, you aren’t wr-“ Jo was about to reveal the truth, as King Julien was actually correct, but was cut off again.

“-you aren’t going to call him _your majesty_ ever again.” Skipper was at his limit for lemur antics, and now the newest recruit was adding fuel to that ring of fire. “Doing so will be counted as treason against our unit.”

“Yes sir!” Jo felt torn between showing Julien and Skipper respect, since so far she had always done her best to appropriately address people.

“Don’t let them wash too much from your brain.” Julien looked at her one more time, thoughtfully. He was still sure he was not wrong, but who was he to keep a penguin from subtext?

The penguins had already begun moving out, keeping a track of time and having enough of their fluffy neighbors Jo took one last look to Maurice to give an appreciative nod, before sliding off with the paper to her side.


	4. A Place for Everything

Over the next few hours, Skipper took a load off, glad to have a clear schedule since that _encounter_ left him with a splitting headache. In the meantime, Kowalski had rearranged a corner of his lab and had Rico carefully blast one of the walls that was less integral to the support of the base. Emphasis on _less_ , as he had to explain carefully to Jo that there was now a constant risk of structural collapse over the new studio space.

Rico heaved up the supplies, surprisingly still in the order she had chosen them. Of course, the one roll of paper he had slurped up was currently unusable, but she put it under a cinderblock so it would dry flat. Soon, she had her space all organized, and Rico helped her move a spare desk into the new area.

It was late in the afternoon when she sat at the table, considering how lucky it was they had given her a space, made her a member of the team, and accommodated for her skills. Noting the silence of the room and accompanying lab space, she waddled her way through the door that led to the main room of their headquarters. The quartet were all enjoying their well-earned downtime but turned their attention to the 5th penguin.

“Everything is all set up now, sir.” She addressed Skipper, who seemed to be dialing radio frequencies into a tracking utility. “I’m ready for my first assignment.”

“Alright Joe, your first mission is to make portraits of everyone in our unit so we can keep them on file.” He glanced at the portrait Jo had already made of him, before putting it in a drawer where his other western paraphernalia was kept. “That includes another one of me, no fancy additions this time.”

She nodded, before slinking back through the door. There was a lot to do, but with confidence, the five portraits should be finished before the end of the day. Going to work, the original four were called out of their relaxation stations by Skipper.

“Alright men, it seems that everything is _hunky-dory_ but there is still one big problem with the new guy.”

“He has no sense of balance?” Kowalski tried to fill in the blank, taking account of the many acrobatic failures he had witnessed the uncoordinated penguin endure.

“That too, but the _big_ problem is his lack of provenance.” Skipper narrowed his eyes as he tapped the tracking device they used to monitor locations globally. “Out of every zoo in the US of A, there are no changes in penguin numbers accounted for anywhere.”

“What about internationally?” Private piped up, still wanting to give his new friend the benefit of the doubt.

“No dice. This bogey bird had no evidence of coming through any customs from land or sea.”

“What about the air?” Kowalski posed the option.

“Negatory - which brings me to my mission for you three.” Skipper leaned in to make his point clear. “Monitor the new recruit while we train him. See if you can get that origin intel. For all we know, Joe could be a spy.”

“Why don’t we just ask him what zoo he was delivered from?” Private thought all of this conspiracy was a little much, even for Skipper.

“Private does have a point. With the information on his allergies concluding he was born and raised in captivity, it might be worthwhile to just ask the new recruit.” Kowalski tapped his crayon on the top of his clipboard.

“Denied. We do this the old fashioned way.” The flat-headed leader slammed a flipper on the table. “Subversively asking vague questions to slowly build a corkboard of information before dramatically solving the puzzle and figuring out the truth.”

Private and Kowalski shared a look of concern before looking back over to Rico, who seemed to be lost in thought as he looked from the light fixture above to the other birds.

“Operation: leery theory is a go.” As the commanding bird finished his catchphrase, a moment of pause fell over the group. Where normally they would spring into action, this operation was more of a waiting game, and it left a sense of stagnancy to the group.

“We do still need to deal with other issues on our agenda.” Kowalski showed the group a list of pictures related to various problems occurring in the zoo. The other group members sighed, before getting to work discussing the new missions. After a while, the scene faded to a whiteboard full of ideas, and Kowalski explaining why the options were so limited.

“It would be nearly impossible to get to the water main without going through Bert’s enclosure.” The brainiac crossed out that diagram, looking back to Rico. “We all remember the last time.”

Rico shuddered, and curled up in his chair, horrified at the thought.

The moment was interrupted, by the lab door creaking open. Jo came out, holding her own clipboard and pencil. The four turned to face her, and something felt different about the way their gazes landed. Timidly holding the board closer to her chest as a shield from their scrutiny, she spoke softly.

“I hope I’m not interrupting anything, but I need to finish your portraits…” She glanced at the rough sketches she had made of each penguin, but now the details needed to be added in. “Sorry, I’ll be quiet and draw over here.”

Skipper glanced around at his men, suspicions rising. Even though the others had kept his paranoia in check so far, it had been a long day and now the leader was keeping his eyes peeled. The group continued though, and their various discussions of problems gave her long enough to finish the artwork requested.

It was nerve-wracking, not just for Skipper, but the others as well. None of them were really used to being stared at, and the same feeling of being scrutinized was cast over each of them. Private seemed to enjoy it, though. His days in the limelight as the cutest team member had prepared him for this. For Jo, it was just another day of making art from observation. Of course, as with any portrait, she captured their main features and tried to focus on their unique qualities. She was almost finished and started getting lost in the details when Skipper surprised her by sliding up to view the work on the clipboard.

She could still tell something wasn't right about each of them, but she hoped in time she would get to know them and understand them visually enough to truly capture a likeness in the future. Still, these should work for now. Her heart sank as Skipper scrutinized her work. While she could see every mistake, he looked at the portraits as a whole.

“Not bad soldier!” He could recognize each of his men, and even if it wasn't exact these portraits were much better than the crayon scribbles Kowalski had on record now. “Did you make one of yourself?”

Jo nodded, sliding it out from under the others. 

It had a slightly different feeling. For some reason, it felt like it had been forever since she had used her flippers for dexterous work. This, along with the aspect of misdirected emphasis all self-portraits have added to the odd vibe of the artwork. She had made her beak bigger than it really was, and her feathers were extra fluffy in the art. It was a visual representation of how it felt to be shoved into a role, and feel like you were out of place. 

Skipper could sense the disconnect, but chalked it up to his bias getting the best of him. After all, this was good art and he couldn’t put his flipper on what seemed off about it.

“Good work, your first task is complete.” The leader nodded, swiping the portraits and handing each one to the corresponding penguin. Private hugged him, Kowalski smiled and nodded, and Rico tapped the drawing of his scar and then ran a flipper through his spiked feathers with a happy growl.

“I’ll put these in our files.” Kowalski went around the room to collect the images, putting them on his board for safekeeping.

“Tomorrow, we can start scoping out other zoo civilians that need visual ID for our records. Marlene, Roger…” Skipper tried to think of others to focus on, trying to avoid seeing the lemurs two days in a row. “Kowalski, make a list in the A.M.”

“Aye-aye Skipper!” He made a note to make a list.

“Lights out, men.” The HQ automatically went into night mode as soon as the clock hit twenty-two-hundred hours, 10 pm, and the quartet each leaped into their notch in the wall. Jo was yet again left in the dust.

It was already lights out? At 10 pm? She was so used to staying up past midnight now and was still filled with anxiety from the day. For some reason, she didn’t feel tired at all.

“What’s the hold-up rookie?” Skipper asked with a disgruntled glance to the penguin standing in the sudden darkness. _Surely_ he could understand the concept of lights out.

“I’m not used to going to sleep so early…” She admitted.

“Well get used to it. We settle at twenty-two-hundred hours and rise at oh-six-hundred, except on intensive training days where we get up even earlier.” He tapped the wall. “Get your tail feathers up in your bunk! That’s an order.”

She nodded, remembering to salute a little late, before hopping up to the fifth slot. It was weird, how comfortable the concrete was because of the insulating blubber. Like penguins had a natural pillow suit on 24/7…

It was hard enough to fall asleep normally, but in this dark and unfamiliar space, she felt wide awake. Of course, not to worry about intruders or emergencies with four armed attack penguins beside her. Instead, she hoped she would get sleepy at some point even if it took a few hours, and then getting up early would reset her sleep schedule to fall in line with the others. One day of exhaustion would be worth it.

Only, she never did fall asleep. Glancing at the illuminated clock across the room, even by 0200 there wasn’t even a sense of sleepiness. All she was thinking of now is how confusing military time was, but also how it simplified time without the addition of am or pm… but if that was standard, then why wasn’t the metric system standard? Left to her thoughts for the next four hours, many fleeting ideas came and went during this grueling meditation. At last, a blaring alarm went off to wake up the penguins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's note: I am trying to keep the art as authentic to the story as possible. I grip my tools without using my thumb, and it has been a very fun challenge! If there are any critiques on the visual or written work, let me know! I'm always open to suggestions and edits. Thank you so much!


	5. Averment

As the men rolled out and into their combative stances, Jo slinked down behind them as she dropped to the floor. It was odd. She did indeed still feel tired but not in the same way as before laying down. Perhaps she had gone to sleep and didn’t realize it.

It seemed the others had their morning routine down to a science. For Kowalski, it certainly was. As Rico preened his feathers and made eyes at his Ms. Perky doll, Private read quilting monthly while enjoying some peanut butter winkies.

She looked around, spotting a coffee pot, and waddling over to it. There didn’t seem to be any cups nearby. As the lost penguin continued searching, her supervisor took notice.

“Are you looking for something?” Skipper raised a feathered brow before sipping the cup of coffee he had snatched before her.

“Yes sir!” She saluted and almost knocked the coffee pot over.

“Calm that jive!” Skipper shook his head. “At ease.”

“We have permission to speak freely before we start our training.” Private nodded as he squirreled away his box of chocolates. Jo looked back to Skipper who gave a little nod of confirmation.

“I was looking for a cup…” She crossed her flippers over each other as if she had hands to clasp.

“Why didn’t you just say so?” Skipper opened a cabinet in the corner that contained twenty or so metal mugs. He threw one at Joe with a suave air about him. 

Catching the mug, she bowed softly in thanks before holding it up close and going back to pour some coffee. It was a little hard to pour, but with two flippers she got the job done. Before she could get a first sip she was alarmed to find a fish slammed into the fresh cup of coffee.

“Ah!” She recoiled, before looking at Skipper next to her who was swirling his own coffee with a fish.

“Don’t worry, it’s tuna.” Skipper sipped, squinting at Joe.

“Thank you.” She looked down and noticed its glassy eyes staring back. Flipping the fish over, she swirled the coffee and grimaced a little on the inside before taking a sip. It wasn’t half bad! Some sugar or cream would ruin it but tuna in fresh black coffee could work.

The scientist came over with his clipboard at the ready.

“Skipper, I have the list of civilians as requested.” Kowalski had started to flip through the list, recounting the names of their zoo neighbors, when Rico slapped the schedule.

“Fiiiiiiish!” The scarred bird smiled wide, before making his way up and out the exit. Kowalski and Skipper started sliding, following Rico. Jo was caught off guard again, but another flipper nudged her arm.

“Come on so, I won’t let you get left behind again.” Private nodded, and she followed his lead to slip to the ladder and make it out in time for the feast to begin. She had no idea what to expect, but seeing the woman bringing the bucket filled with fish did seem like a harvest bounty for aquatic birds!

She kept her distance, as the others excitedly clamored at the disguised hatch. Alice lazily dumped the fish, as she did every time she had to feed the penguins, but this time her eyes shot open as she held the now-empty bucket.

“Wait a minute… since when do we have five penguins?” She did a quick count, before singling out Jo as the odd one out. She looked at the other four, before grabbing a plank to gain access to the concrete plateau of their moated habitat.

“You penguins keep busy, huh?” She remarked as she grabbed Jo. The new bird looked back at the men, even though they were still eating they stopped to watch as Alice took the newbie away. “Hefty little guy.”

“She took Joe…” Private said, his voice tinged with sadness.

“Now that’s suspicious.” Skipper put his flippers on his hips.

“What’s suspicious? Alice is obviously taking him to the animal care facility to get checked in.” Kowalski tried to keep his leader in check, getting flashbacks to when Buck Rockgut would visit.

“We usually unbox the crates, right?”

“Affirmative.”

“Joe arrived already unboxed, correct?”

“That is correct, yes.”

“If Alice is taking him to be checked in now, that means he wasn’t unboxed by zoo staff or us.” Skipper started connecting some dots. He was trying not to let his paranoia get the best of him, but this was something unordinary. He turned to face Kowalski. “Make a note of this, the first piece of evidence for our cork board.”

Kowalski started scribbling on his clipboard, as the scene faded to a veterinarian doing the same motion on a clipboard of their own.

“Alright, it looks like our tests are in!” The doctor looked to the zookeeper, affectionately petting Jo on her head.

“So what’s the big news, doc?”

“She doesn’t have any diseases and we have the go-ahead to get her up to date on all of her shots.”

“Ah, so you’re not a little guy after all!” Alice chirped, getting up and going over to the computer at the desk. She was more cheerful than on her first day working here which, considering her usual mood, isn’t saying much.

As she accessed the zoo’s penguin database, she typed loudly. “That makes for two female and three male penguins.”

Jo took a moment to pause as she overheard Alice from the kennel in the office. She wasn’t the only female penguin!? The vet tech came back in with two syringes while the other human finished inputting the new information.

“Just a little pinch!” The warning was heeded by the penguin, but the pain of the shot was still not as shocking as the revelation such classified information had caused. “…and one more. There, all set~”

While the veterinarian gave Jo a dry fishcake treat, the penguin thought of what little she knew about her teammates. Every time she wondered who was the other female, her mind settled on Private. She shook her head, considering how rude it was to label someone based on actions alone. Besides, they all seemed happy to be called sir.

“Yo, Alice.” The voice over the walkie talkie broke Jo’s train of thought.

“What is it, now?”

“Have you finished cleaning that mess in the elephant exhibit?” Alice had come over to unlatch the kennel, picking up the penguin gently with an arm as she held the hand radio.

“I’m going, sheesh! I got sidetracked because of a surprise in the penguin exhibit.”

“Yeah yeah, just get that mess cleaned up, pronto!” With a click Alice holstered the device.

“Whatever.” The pair reached the penguin habitat, and using the plank to walk across the water she placed the penguin down gently.

Luckily, the melancholy keeper was focused on her next grueling task enough to not notice the lack of other penguins. Jo waddled around the empty habitat, carefully checking the latch when the coast was clear. Not seeing anyone, she cringed at the sore pain from the shots, wondering where her new friends had gone.

With a jump cut to Kowalski stuck in a tube leading into a Manhattan juice cafe, the audience receives somewhat of an answer to her pondering. The tall penguin struggled once more, as the other three exchanged glances.

“Come on, men! I need options!” Skipper pointed at the other two before a muffled clang followed by a metallic voice spoke up.

“If this is a standard laundry vent, it should be able to be cut fairly easily with some sort of sharp tool such as a saw.”

At the word saw, Rico coughed up his favorite chainsaw with glee. Skipper gave him the go-ahead and he roughly cut his friend out of the circular metal prison.

“Thanks for overestimating my latitude.” Kowalski stood, still trapped in the pipe, but able to stand up with some effort. Further down the pipe, a small accented shrill voice could be distinguished.

“I still have not found a mango.”

“Mort, don’t you see?” Skipper shook his head as he questioned the languid lemur. “You won’t be finding any mango ever again if you don’t comply with our efforts of rescue.”

“Oh wait I found something fruity.”

The penguins share a confused glance, including Kowalski even though he is still obscured by the metal covering.

“Never-mind, it is just a detergent.” Even Mort could tell the difference between a delicious berry and deadly laundry objects. “Okay, if I come out will you help me find a mango?”

Skipper sighed, before giving in to the request. Anything to make this search and rescue operation less tedious.

“Alright little lemur, if you comply we will help you secure a mango.” At Skippers go ahead, Rico coughed up a rope, which Kowalski with hindsight now thought should have been option A to begin with.

As the men, minus Kowalski, grabbed ahold of Rico on either side, the rope tightened as Mort started to ascend from the dryer in the fruit bar’s laundry room. When he surfaced, he was covered in lint, but the wind took care of that fairly quickly.

“Alright, let’s move.” Skipper motioned for the others to head out, but Private whimpered slightly, causing his leader to pause. “What is it?”

“We… didn’t get the mango for Mort.” He held his little flippers up near his chin, and when Skipper looked from Private’s sad eyes to Sad Eyes, the soft spot for his Corporal made him rethink their plan of action.

“Alright, how much are the mangoes?” Skipper sighed once more before the team started a new heist to fulfill their promise.

Back in HQ, the rookie was working hard to fulfill her promise. These penguins had given her a place to stay, materials to work with, and she wanted to do her best to make it up to them.

She was busy painting. She’d measured one of the sparse gray walls in the main room and was creating a painting as a way to spruce up the headquarters. A window into an arctic world.

Referencing the documentary, the landscape was starting to take shape, when she heard the latch snap open.

Getting up she hurried to wash her brushes in Kowalski’s sink. Done with her task, she switched the faucet back to eye-wash mode as the scientist had requested it be left when not in use.


	6. Practice, Practice, Practice

Private was the first one down the ladder, and he immediately waddled his way into the lab to check for any sign Joe was back. Upon finding her, he rushed in for a hug.

“Joe!” Rico gruffed, bobbing his head as Private finished his hug.

“Oh, hey guys!” She smiled, happy to see them after such a long day. “I mean, sirs…”

“Did Alice do horrid things to you!?” Private asked, nervously.

“Oh, no… she just got me checked into the zoo and I had a couple of shots. What is interesting is that I also found out that-“

“-that MENACE!” Skipper shuddered with every fibre of his being. “Even _one_ shot is way too much to handle. _Two in one day_? They said it couldn’t be done!”He recalled the chimps’ warning.

“It’s alright, it really wasn’t that bad…” Jo assured the leader sheepishly. “What I’m wondering is about the idea that one of you is a f-“

“Afraid? No -of course not!” Skipper needed to stay strong, and this newbie hadn’t gone through nearly enough by his side for him to have any moment of weakness now.

While the higher ranks turned to give Skipper a knowing look, Jo took a deep breath. She had a new theory and wanted to give it a test run just to see if she could prove her hypothesis.

“I’m a wo-“

“A wounded soldier, for sure!” Private wondered if Joe was trying to get time off.

“I just found out that I’m not the only fe-“

“Of course you aren’t the only fearless fighter! Rico, Myself, and even _Private_ show no fear when at needlepoint.” Skipper would have slapped him but settled for a disgruntled look as the scientist backed away slightly.

“We should set the record straight, I’m really a g-“

“A _gestalt Joe_?” Skipper shook off his sense of fright as he spun the words around to make a new version of jack of all trades. Jo thought this _finishing her words_ trope was getting out of hand.

“Gi-“

“Gigaflops?” Kowalski questioned her strange word choice. “Why would we be calculating computer speed now?”

She almost laughed at the absurdity, but perhaps she had been cursed and now had to be prevented from speaking about her true self. She was about to give it another try when a small British penguin spoke up from afar.

“What is this?” Private looked at her unfinished painting. Jo and the others waddled over to see what he was asking about.

“Oh, I just started painting something for the main room…” Her voice trailed off, and she noticed they were more stern with their gazes. “It isn’t finished yet.”

“How much longer do you think this will take?” Skipper asked, not seeing the painting as anything much yet. He had been out for a while, and his grouchiness was impacting his harsh critique.

“About 5-6 more hours, sir!” She didn’t salute but instead held up her flippers nervously as Skipper shook his head.

“Put it away, we have more important training to get to.” He wanted to set a precedent for the latest addition to the team. Immediately she got the message, understanding that paintings usually look awful in their beginnings.

While she put the painting away, a pit grew in her stomach as she felt embarrassed about her lack of accomplishment. The way they just waddled off lackadaisically was so different from how great it felt for them to marvel at her portraits. Still, this was no time to give up hope. The optimist inside herself thought of how much they may have been through this day.

Joining them in the main room, she noticed there was a new spot at the table, causing Skipper to be at the head of the square while the two higher ranks Rico and Kowalski each had a side to themselves. As Private tapped the seat to his right she joined him as the lowest post.

“Looks like I finally have a right-hand man!” Private giggled, and she smiled back, nodding in agreement.

“Mission report!” Skipper barked, Private taking the hint to stop his banter.

“After an emergency call from Maurice and King Julien, we discovered that Mort had been missing for about 20 hours. When questioned, both lemurs confessed they had no idea where he was but found it odd how quiet their habitat had been.”

“With further questioning, Maurice recalled how he had overheard Mort muttering about deluxe mangoes to be found somewhere in the city. That was around the last time he had recalled seeing the small lemur.” Kowalski flipped the page to continue. 

“Our investigation of the surrounding area uncovered a stack of flyers as well as poster ads throughout the zoo for ‘New Yo Juice’ which is an establishment serving vegan fruit juice drinks and smoothies in east side Manhattan.” 

“Upon arrival, it was fairly easy to locate possible entry points for a lemur fitting mort’s description, and indeed the sound of his voice was an easy confirmation of both his identity and location.”

“There was a flaw in option A, where a miscalculation on circumference caused Kowalski to become trapped in the laundry vent,” Kowalski continued, even though Private had started giggling again.

“That’s where we need to focus. We can’t have miscalculations costing precious time during missions!” Skipper appeared to write something down in his own report. Kowalski sighed softly, nodding.

“After Kowalski was rescued by Rico, the team made a deal with Mort that allowed us to move forward with our search and rescue operation. Later, with the lemur satisfied with obtaining a mango, he was brought back to his habitat.” The scientist looked uncomfortable. “Kowalski was then cut out of the length of laundry vent by Rico, and this metal will be saved for scrap.” 

Jo looked at the circular indentation that went around Kowalski’s feathers at the point where his body widened.

“Barring the few snags, I’d say our impromptu lemur search and rescue was overall a success.” Skipper finished his notes, passing it to Kowalski who added it to a manilla folder. Catching a glimpse, it seemed they were doodling events instead of actually writing. 

“Now, let’s kick this unit into high gear…” Skipper paused for dramatic effect. “Your training begins now!”

Quickly throwing an ace kept under the table at Joe, Skipper tested his reflexes. She ducked in the nick of time but flopped out of her seat onto the ground, a little less than gracefully.

“Move, move, move!” Skipper sidled back as the other three penguins backflipped and hopped to different stations around the base. Jo took a moment to scootch herself under the table as a small shelter in the center of the room.

From her place underneath, she saw fire spewing from Rico’s direction as he took out a flamethrower. Looking at the underside of the table there were a dozen aces, as well as a copious amount of chewed gum.

Thinking fast, she slid out, grabbing the chair to use as a shield or weapon. Seeing the others darting forth, fighting each other, she skidded to a corner of the room. As fast as it began, the sudden attacks stopped.

“Good work on reflexes! You lost _a lot_ of style points but you would have made it out alive.” Skipper smirked as he leaned a flipper on the sturdy tabletop. 

“That’s it?” She set down the chair and came forward slowly.

“Oh no, we still have our formation routine to do yet!” Private smiled, looking forward to it.

It was very similar to how she would train in karate. Something that had always been close to her heart, and being in a training grid with the men was already strengthening their bond.

Their forms, as well, were similar to what she knew. Even the different stances were simple enough to pick up. They even clued her into different styles of jumps and flips, and landing strategies.

It would still take practice. In return, she showed them how to do the stance she used against Private the other day.

“…and then if you press your feet and twist them in the opposite direction, your legs lock and using the ground you become sturdier.” She hunkered down, making the v shape with her flippers as the others started getting the hang of it.

Skipper nodded, before standing back up. The others followed his lead.

“Well done!” He lilted, before sharing some high fives with the others. Jo caught on a bit late, but not late enough for it to count as _too slow_.

The birds all stretched and waddled to various places in the main room as they got ready for settling. Finally, when the clock read 2200 hours, the base quieted and the quintessential team roosted in their bunks.

Jo was bewildered. She still didn’t feel that tired, even after having a rough night’s sleep yesterday, and the intense training this evening. Racking her mind, she wondered if it was the thought of an unfinished painting that was getting to her.

Skipper had told her to put it away, but she wasn’t used to leaving art unfinished for too long. Still, he was in charge, so she attempted to fall asleep for a while longer.

When she saw that two hours had elapsed, and there was still no sign of slumber, the artist decided to take a stand. Holding onto Private’s bunk ledge for support, she hopped down as quietly as possible.

Skipper stirred slightly and her heart nearly stopped, but as he made a lazy slapping motion and rolled over, the coast cleared. Sneaking into Kowalski’s lab, the door creaking was another close call, and so she left it open a crack hoping the light wouldn’t disturb the others.

In this quiet room at midnight, she felt at peace. She waddled around, examining the various tests being performed throughout the lab, keeping her distance for safety.

Slipping around, getting water, and resuming her painting she felt happier than just laying around with her inane thoughts. It was when she finished setting up for another round of painting that she was startled.

“Joe?” A hushed British voice caught her off guard. Turning to face the small penguin who blinked in the bright overhead lights, she embarrassedly attempted to cover up the work station.

“Private?” She straightened up as he waddled closer, rubbing his eye and holding an illuminated Lunacorn plushie. “I was just…”

“You were just having trouble adjusting to our schedule.” He held his Lunacorn and looked at Joe. “The light from your flipper hitting Princess Self-Respectra woke me up, then I saw the open door…”

“Oh, I’m so sorry! I wouldn’t have woken you on purpose!” She started panicking a bit, hushing her voice to not wake the others before adding a formality. “I apologize, sir!”

“Goodness! It’s quite alright Joe!” Private smiled, putting a flipper on his cheek. “Don't worry, you’re not in any trouble, I just wanted to see what you were up to.”

She took a deep breath, before going back over to her station. At the far side of the lab, surrounded by another three walls of insulating concrete she spoke a bit louder, but still softly as it was early morning now.

“I felt awful not being able to finish this painting.” Looking at the scratchy patches of blue, she sighed. “Maybe once I finish I will be a bit more tired and can get some shut-eye before the alarm.”

“Mind if I stay around and watch?” The little penguin beside her pulled up a chair, heaving it into place gently next to hers in the small studio.

“I-“ She looked at the time.

“Don’t worry, we can be tired together tomorrow. I’m awake now.” He nodded as he stayed up in solidarity.

Jo smiled at Private, before sitting down to continue the painting, meditating to mix the paints and silently appreciating the moment.


	7. Posing a Question

It had been a short while, and Jo had started introducing new pigments into the arctic landscape. While she worked, Private was riveted as she combined the paints as if they were some sort of unspoken code.

“Joe, how do you know which colours to choose?” He asked a little loudly, causing her to shush him, and she immediately realized that she had hushed a superior.

“Sorry!” She bowed slightly to the tired Corporal. He waved his flipper at her formality and nodded. “Well, I studied how colors work together and different combinations of tones. Sometimes it is just a happy little accident.”

“No wonder your studio is in the lab! It all sounds so scientific when you speak of it like that.” Private propped his head upon his doll before his eyes widened at her new inclusion of pink in the painting.

“Pink? I’ve never seen a sky like that!”

“I thought it might be a nice way to add some warmth to the snow, without using yellow.” She explained as Private giggled, doing his best to stifle it at the late hour.

“It looks lovely.” He nodded as she added it to reflect off the snow, and as she gazed at the landscape, her mind returned to the peculiar events of the day before.

“Hey… is it alright if I ask you a bit of a weird question?” She posed the idea while mixing a new shade of bright turquoise.

“Oh gosh, I suppose it’s alright!” He looked at Joe in anticipation. “Course, I might not answer depending on the question.”

“Well…” She had stopped painting as she thought through her wording carefully. “Are you _technically_ a female penguin? I mean, I know you like being called sir and-“

“What?” Private was shocked, and the stark almost betrayed tone to his voice made her heart jump as if she had just destroyed their friendship.

“I wasn’t trying to make you uncomfortable, but when I was at the veterinary clinic I overheard that one of you, biologically speaking, is listed in the zoo records as a female penguin so…”

There was an awkward silence, intensified by the fog of the morning. Jo felt worse than ever, but as she thought of something else to say to ease the tension, Private’s smile returned.

“That’s Skipper!” He would have laughed but indeed the small penguin was getting a bit more exhausted. 

“Skipper!?” Jo was alarmed at the new information, but that didn’t make him any less authoritative or manly.

“It was all a big miss-understanding!” Private worked to clear up the misinformation he had just shared. “Kowalski ran his own DNA test and found that we are all males.”

“Actually…” Jo timidly dabbed her brush as she began her revelation for the 10th time. “I’m not.”

Before she knew it, the awkward tense air was back, and she realized that her reveal hadn’t been cut off! Maybe the plot had decided it was time to get a move on, or her curse had been lifted through an act of true love or something similar. In any case, now she had to deal with the fallout.

“You’re joking. Just pulling my leg!” Private tried to ease the tension.

“No, I’m not kidding.” Jo gave Private a serious look, setting her paints down on the desk and putting her flippers on each other as she crossed them in front of herself. “I have been trying to tell you all since I arrived but always got cut off…”

“Wait a minute…” Private racked his mind, thinking of those moments in a small montage. “This is huge news! I’ll help you tell the others, you won’t be cut off again!”

“No!” She stopped Private from getting up, forgetting to be as quiet. “They can’t find out now!”

“Why not? Haven’t you been trying to say it?” Private questioned her.

“Yes, but that was before I got to know how Skipper and the others are. They already treat me as a rookie, and I can handle that, but some of the derogatory things they have said…” She shook her head. “I don’t want to add another layer of difficulty when trying to fit into this unit.”

“They can be a little mean sometimes, yes, but I don’t think they would treat you differently!” Private kept his hopes up. Then again, he recalled the way the team dynamic had shifted before.

“I don’t know…” She ran a flipper along the edge of the work table.

“If I do keep this secret though, I’d have to lie!” Private whined.

“It’s not lying if you just don’t say anything!” Jo tried to offer some sort of flawed reasoning. Private was about to protest but considered how he kept his own secret of his alias as the pro-mini-golfer Mr. Tux.

“Alright, Joe, I’ll keep your secret.” He tapped his chin, and upon hearing a creak in the distance he hushed a bit before continuing. “Wait, is that your real name?”

“Partially.” She looked at Private, then to the doorway, hushing as well. “It’s short for Joan, but you can still call me Jo, I don’t mind!”

Private nodded with glee, and they returned to their seats as she continued painting. It still had some final detailing needed, but she noticed it was around 0400 on the clock, and didn't want to keep the other up much longer.

“What do you think of it?” She asked Private.

“I think it’s beautiful.” He nodded, glad their friendship hadn’t seemed to change too much.

“We probably need to head to bed now, before the others wake up.”

“Yeah, I’m exhausted, and I was just watching you work!” Private yawned, as Jo returned the painting to its drying area. She wondered if Private had gotten so sleepy by not having anything to do. After all, objects in motion tend to stay in motion while those at rest tend to get more sleepy by the second.

“Goodnight, Private.” She whispered as they waddled back, being extra careful as the door to the lab creaked closed with a click. Private motioned to Jo to go ahead of him, and she settled in as he hopped softly into the bunk next to her.

Their loud alarm seemed to go off so soon after, even though it had been a couple of hours since their midnight deluge had ended. Jo felt… odd, to say the least. Not sick, or that tired, but still groggy in some way.

As Jo hopped down, Skipper took note of Private not getting up right away.

“Private?” He stood on Kowalski’s bunk to speak to the plump little bird.

“Peanut butter.” Private motioned opening a candy in his sleep. Skipper slapped him, and he shot up. “Winky!”

“What has gotten into you?” Skipper understood the other day when Joe’s footfalls had woken them up earlier than the alarm, but sleeping in was reserved for the few rest and sick days they each had per year. “Are you feeling alright?”

“Aye Skippah, I’m just a wee tired since-“ He hesitated, remembering the promise he had made to Jo last night. “-I had a rough night last night. Bellyache and such.”

“Ah, a bellyache could be a symptom of many underlying issues. Appendicitis, colon cancer, and other deadly ailments…” Kowalski scribbled the options, starting to sound like WebMD. “Or… it could just be you ate too many Peanut Butter Winkies. Again.”

“Yeah. I’m sure that’s it!” Private took the least horrifying option, lest his team take him to a vet without good cause. He got up, plopping to the ground before the others shrugged and went about their routine like yesterday. He joined Jo at the coffee pot and she got him out a mug to use.

“Here you are, sir.”

“Thank you, Jo!” He winked at her, and she looked to the other three who took notice of the suspicious act.

“You’re very welcome!” She made a show of winking back absurdly, and the others chalked it up to the lower ranks having some sort of weird sense of humor this morning.

Later, after the morning feeding and cleaning routine, they gathered around to discuss the agenda for the day at Skipper’s command.

“Alright men, what’s on the table for today?” He looked around, noticing Rico was laying on the table with a raised brow, propping himself up on a flipper. With a continued glare from his commander, Rico groaned sadly that his joke was not seen humorous by Skipper.

“Can I bring Jo to meet Marlene?” Private piped up, to the surprise of Skipper and Kowalski.

“Private, we have zoo maintenance work to do today. We need you, and preferably a second pair of flippers.” Skipper started denying his request when Kowalski took out his abacus and clacked it around.

“Skipper, it appears there may be room for a short visit while I finish prepping the calculations for our work today. Around 45 minutes.” Private beamed, before looking back to Skipper.

“Hmm. It seems you’ve lucked out again today, young Private.” Skipper straightened up, before looking sternly from Joe to the second-lowest in command. “Permission granted. Be back in HQ by O-seven-hundred-forty-five.”

“Thank you, sir!” Private stood on his chair, saluting, before nudging Jo who followed suit. Skipper tried to stop himself from smiling, but it couldn’t be helped when he realized how happy he had made Private.

The two rushed out of the latch, Private leading Jo above ground. Closing the latch softly, Skipper looked to his men to continue giving orders.

“Alright Kowalski, you have this time to prep for today’s missions. Rico, make sure the car is in ship shape! I want to test Joe’s driving so we know if he will be a good option as a chauffeur for future missions.”

The two saluted, before springing into action, heading through the doorways that led to the lab and garage respectively. Skipper swirled his coffee, sipping it as he enjoyed the morning bliss.

He made his way around the room, trying to fill out his time productively, putting on some classical music as he looked around the closed zoo with his periscope. There would be plenty of time to accomplish their tasks before it opened at 1000 hours. After surveilling the zoo, the leader double-checked that Kowalski and Rico were out of the room before opening the panel where he kept his 24/7 cam system. It wasn’t necessarily a task he did every day, but it was important to keep his base safe from intruders.

He also knew it was fun to see what his men got up to when they thought nobody was watching.

Rewinding back to the other day, after he stopped watching the sparring match in the tunnel, he cycled through, skipping around to see Kowalski humming at a framed picture of Doris the Dolphin and putting it away before Rico and Joe came in to make the art studio.

With a sigh and a chuckle, he fast-forwarded, making a mental note he would need to expand the system to include the art studio even if it would take some time to do himself.

There wasn’t a lot else, a few jokes at his expense he also made mental notes of, and as it came to the tapes from last night he was about to speed through. That is... until he noticed a discrepancy.


	8. Start Spreading the News

Going back, Skipper slowed down the tape, watching the rookie sneak out of bed and head to the lab. Switching to the lab view, he noticed him slipping around, studying the secret experiments.

Skipper had really tried to put a lid on his paranoia, but this was too much. He was getting a bit heated, but that feeling grew ten-fold when he saw Private enter the room.

Turning up the volume, he did his best to discern their words, searching through the long areas of silence. When he heard his name, his blood boiled. Whatever they were discussing, he didn’t want any part in it.

Further, the leader felt betrayed by Private, as he realized the young soldier had been roped into the conspiracy. Now, it was down to Kowalski and Rico to help him get to the bottom of this.

“Kowalski!” Skipper made a copy of the sound file, ready to play it back for the scientist. With a creak, the lab door opened and the tall bird slipped his goggles off.

“Sir? I really should be getting back to my calculations.”

“You can find that intel in the zoo system.” Skipper sighed, before starting the sound clip. “Here, have a listen.”

[[“That’s Skipper!”…“Skipper!?”

“Wait a minute…” “This is huge news! I’ll help you [too accented to understand at a distance]… you won’t be cut off again!” 

“No!” “They can’t find out now!”… “Why not? [unintelligible]”…..“If I do keep this secret though, I’d have to lie!”…“It’s not lying if you just don’t say anything!”….. “Alright, Joe, I’ll keep your secret.”]]

Skipper teared up but avoided crying in front of Kowalski. He turned his head before speaking again.

“I knew there was something off about the new guy, but now he has gone too far!” Skipper stood tall, trying to puff up and recompose himself. Kowalski was alarmed, but wished the recording quality wasn’t stuck in the 1900s.

“This does indeed seem like a kettle of fishy business.” Kowalski reached a flipper out to comfort Skipper, but the leader slapped it away.

“They’re planning something, and I need to figure out what.” Skipper paced, going over to the mission plan on the table and using the whiteboard. “We need to separate them when they return. Split them up, I’ll take Rico and the Rookie and do the driving test, which will also be a secret psychological test.”

“I’ll keep Private distracted, take him to the office as I gather the intel for the necessary zoo maintenance and upgrades, and see what other information I can force out of him.”Kowalski offered before Skipper gave him a worried look. “Force out of him through non-physical means, such as bribery with sweets.”

“I’ll get Rico up to speed before they get back.” Skipper looked at the 0730 on the clock, and Kowalski carted out their conspiracy corkboard.

Tacking up a photocopy of Private’s portrait, he linked it to the other information with a red string. 

“I wonder what they are plotting that has to do with Marlene…” Skipper appeared worried as he gazed at the picture. As the scene faded from the close up of Private’s portrait to the real Private in Marlene’s den, the otter spoke.

“Wow. Okay, I knew you birds could be - for lack of a better term- _birdbrains_ about certain things sometimes… this really takes the cake.”

“Gosh, you really could tell just by the way she waddles?” Private felt bad for Jo.

“Uh. Yeah, that’s obvious.” Marlene looked at Jo. “You know, I’ve been wanting a roommate who is feminine and not too obnoxious if you get sick of those macho minded attack men.”

Jo looked at Marlene, then to Private who gave her a sad gaze.

“Thank you for the generous offer, but I want to stay with the Penguins.” Jo smiled at Private. “They have done so much for me, it’s worth it.” She nodded at her friend, before addressing her new aquatic acquaintance.

“I’m also thankful to have met someone I can come to when I do wish to talk about more feminine things. Besides King Julien-“ Jo said, while Private raised his brows as she titled the lemur. She knew if Skipper was there that would have been it. “-I mean, besides Julien, you are the only one who realized I was a woman right away.”

“See? Even _Julien_ could tell.” Marlene scolded Private, and the little bird poked the tips of his flippers together.

“None of us ignored Joan on purpose!” He put his flippers up with a small whimper. “I mean- _Jo_. We are keeping it a secret from the rest of the team.”

“Huh? Yeah, yeah, no. I don’t blame you.” Marlene thought the name Joan sounded familiar for some odd reason. “I would keep it a secret too if I were in your feathers.”

Private gasped, noticing the time on the floral wall clock. They had to get a move on to avoid being tardy to the mission.

“Sorry Marlene, we have to go!” Private started leading Jo out.

“It was nice meeting you!” Marlene shouted at the Penguins.

Jo was able to give an appreciative nod, before sliding off and over the otter habitat fence. Making their way to the penguin exhibit, their feet landed on the concrete in HQ right in the nick of time. Before them, the three higher-ups scowled before putting on their happy faces to welcome the suspicious duo home.

“Ah gentlemen, welcome back.” Skipper put his flippers on his hips, overacting the kindness. Private could sense something wrong, but considered it his reaction to knowing that Jo wasn’t enjoying being referred to as a gentleman.

“Private! Just the little helper I wanted to see.” Kowalski came over to the Corporal, his new nickname setting off red flags in Private’s mind as the scientist treated him a bit too kindly. “I need your help to collect some information on the measurements of certain fences in the zoo.”

“What? Me? You've never considered me much help in science before. Why not Jo, she-“ Private thought quickly “shielding _him_ from scientific work doesn’t make much sense!”

“Nonsense!” Kowalski asserted as Jo gave a sigh of relief that Private had not spilled the secret so fast. “There will be time for Joe to help me in the lab later. Right now, you’re the man for this job.”

“The rookie is coming with us.” Skipper put his flippers behind his back in an authoritative way. “I want to give him a test, of his driving, and _only his driving_ to make sure we can all operate a vehicle in case of an emergency.”

Rico gave a grunt of agreement, and Jo waddled over, taking one glance back at Private who gave her a nervous look as Kowalski waved at the trio headed for the garage. The pair headed out the latch, and soon found themselves busting into the office, ready to hijack a computer.

Private awkwardly waited around, not used to being on a solo mission with Kowalski. The intelligent penguin tried various passcode combinations, before the correct sequence of 12354 granted access.

“I’m in.” Kowalski spoke the classic hacker catchphrase, and Private sleepily glanced at the screen. In an instant, his blood pressure shot up and he panicked to cover the numbers in the charts.

Kowalski jumped back, wondering what had gotten into Private, as he hadn’t even started bribing or questioning him otherwise. Honestly, if the Corporal hadn’t even reacted in such a way he might not have been suspicious.

“Private, what are you hiding?”

“Hiding? Me?” Private considered what Jo said about lying. “I’m not hiding anything, just standing here.”

“In… front of the screen I need to use to see information.” Kowalski used basic logic to blow through the other’s fallacy.

“Is that so?” Private cheekily started standing in a funny pose, but the tallest penguin wasn’t in the mood for his antics.

“Private, let me see the screen.” Kowalski asked, before commanding, “That’s an order.”

Private whimpered, realizing it was either break his promise or be court-martialed for insubordination. With a sigh and a sorrowful thought of ‘I’m sorry, Jo’ he stepped aside, and Kowalski scrutinized the information on Penguins that Alice had left open.

“I don’t see why you-“ He was looking in the wrong area, and as soon as his eyes landed on the 2 under the female symbol the bird gasped. “Good _googleie moogleie_!”

“You cannot say a word to the others!” Private grabbed Kowalski and shook him a bit. The other shoved Private off of him.

“Are you _mad_?” Kowalski was in shock. “We can’t keep this from Skipper!”

“Yes we can!” Private tried to reason with the logical minded bird. “She is doing her best to fit in, and if you make it more difficult there might not be time for her to assist you with scientific illustrations in the lab!”

Kowalski took out his clipboard to think, before shaking his head and taking a moment to assess this new information. While Private continued bribing him to keep this under wraps for her sake, Jo made another lap around the zoo.

“Left! Right! Double back and another right!” Skipper yelled. Rico was pulling various strings, attached to cardboard cutouts of penguins, other zoo civilians, and officer X. “Quick, when faced with a decision to save a member of the team or a random squirrel, who do you choose?”

“Uh… a member of the team to help me rescue the squirrel!” She thought, considering it would be better to have two trained people in an emergency than to hope that the squirrel could help rescue a teammate.

“Real turtle!” Skipper yelled, causing Jo to screech the tires to a halt to avoid the real animal, burning the traction as the barbie car swirled around, ejecting Skipper over the zoo wall, and sending Jo crashing into several penguin and civilian cutouts. Finally, the car stopped by hitting a foundation. Rico had to make a decision between Skipper and Joe, and decided he could see Joe and rescue him faster. Besides, Skipper had more impact training.

“Joe! Joe!” Rico slid over as fast as he could, checking the car. In the backseat, his Ms. Perky doll was laying on her back, the new bows and kerchief accessories he had gotten a few weeks ago nowhere to be found.

While he did a quick scan for the items, he shook his head. Checking on Joe in the front seat should take priority. It was his luck that his doll’s add-ons wound up on Joe, which became more apparent as the new member of the team sat up.

Something in the way she moved caught his brain up to speed. In a few instances, Rico realized what Julien had seen, and traced back every peculiar gesture Joe had made. It was as if a lightbulb had gone off.

“Uh… Joe.” He spoke with his raspy voice. “Are you a uh…”

The tall spiked penguin pointed at his doll, before picking her up and tapping her before pointing at the penguin in the front seat.

Jo paused for a moment, before nodding yes.

“Oh.” Rico felt uncomfortable, and he shifted his gaze, looking around the zoo before returning his eyes to Jo.

She felt awkward, but the moment of silence was broken as Rico turned swiftly, starting to yell.

“Skipper! Skiiiiip-“ He was cut off as Jo grabbed around him from behind, trying to slow his waddle.

“No! Wait, please don’t tell Skipper!” Rico stopped, lifting up his flippers as she tried to pull him back by his center of gravity.

“Woah Jo.” He shook his head. “Skipper needs help.”

“You aren’t going to tell him?” She looked up at Rico, and the bird smiled down at her and shook his head, putting her mind at ease.

“What’s going on here?” Skipper looked at the newbie holding onto Rico, and then to his third in command.

“Nothing.” Rico gruffed as the pair quickly stood at attention, before a tire rolled by, catching Skipper’s eye long enough for the scarred bird to swipe the Ms. Perky accessories from the penguin next to him.

Skipper darted close to look the birds over, almost as if he was about to ask to see their war faces.

“What was that?” He asked Jo, pointing both of his flippers at the decimated car.

“I-“ Jo could feel herself start to tear up, but she knew this was no moment to let any tears show.

Skipper sensed the apprehension, then motioned his flippers the other way to point out the turtle that had been saved. “You did alright.”

She was astonished that the car managed to miss the slow traveler, and she smiled at it continuing to move forward. A slap brought her back to Skipper, and Rico tensed up.

“Don’t think you won’t be given a punishment for destroying our car!” Skipper glared at Joe, before turning to Rico. “You remember.”

Rico thought back to the horrible days of being chased by a possessed version of the car. He had only just managed to get back to normal, but his heart still raced at the sputter of an engine starting without him.

“Saddle this private up. He’ll be repairing the damage he caused.” Skipper ordered Rico, and the Sergeant saluted.

Skipper slid off towards HQ, having a whole mind to go upgrade his cam system while the others were out of the base, leaving Rico and Jo to clean up the mess. They put all of the parts in the caddy of the car, starting to push it back to the secret garage port.


	9. Penguin Performance

The two were exhausted, but still had a ways to go to push the car. It was still early enough not to worry about people flooding the zoo in a crowd, but Jo was nervous for other reasons. She knew nothing about car mechanics.

It was when Kowalski rounded the corner, followed by Private trying to keep up that she and Rico both stopped pushing the vehicle to see what all the fuss was about. She had half a mind of what had occurred but waited to see what the scientist had to say.

Only, the smartest bird kept his beak shut, looking back and forth at Rico and Jo. Private waddled up, terrified of what Kowalski would do.

“Rico, there’s something you need to know.” The brainy bird looked across the car at the other tall one, as Jo and Private shared a glance of their own. Jo could tell by Private’s expression it was _the news._ Couldn’t even last a day… though she trusted him and could also tell that he hadn't said anything on purpose.

The scarred bird looked down at Jo, before questioning the second in command. “About Jo?”

“Well, yes, actually.” Kowalski glanced down at the car he had only just noticed was in pieces. “Ah! What happened to our car!?”

“Long story.” Rico vocalized, before patting Jo on her head and shaking his own with a tired sigh.

“I could tell you what happened in about two-thousand words,” Jo said, looking up at the birds as she held her flippers up like a shield to her heart. That’s the gesture Rico had seen so often, and seeing it now made him face-flipper. Kowalski took note of it too before he responded.

“I’ll give you twenty.“ He cut two zeroes off of two-thousand, as he didn’t have much time to waste.

“One of the cutouts during my driving test ended up being real, so I swerved to save a turtle’s life.” 

“I bet you’d rather save a life than worry about a hunk of metal!” Private smiled, looking up at Jo happily.

“Of course, but Skipper stormed off, leaving me to fix the car…” She sighed, and Rico nodded to confirm her story.

“Oh no.” Kowalski shook his head, getting back to the topic at hand, er, _flipper_. “Anyway.”

“Alice left the penguin information open,” Private admitted, trying to give Jo a moment to prepare.

“Yes, the information that _Joe_ is actually a female penguin.” Kowalski was ready for the dramatic pause, but none came.

“Yup.” Rico nodded, bobbing his head. “Jo, no e!”

“You knew?” Kowalski felt just as hurt as Skipper had this morning. “How long did you know?”

“How did you find out?” Private was astonished.

“Ka-blamo.” Rico referred to the crash and coughed up the floral Ms. Perky accessory to give it back to Jo.

“I see. The doll accessory landing on _Jo_ in the crash caused you to rethink her actions in a new context.” Like a certain Sherlock Holmes, Kowalski made a very lucky deduction. Rico nodded, impressed.

“She had been trying to tell us all from day one.” Private sighed, still upset that the whole team had made a plot based on suspicions when the truth was so prevalent.

“Well, we all know now, and as soon as I tell Skipper-“ Jo, Rico, and Private all shared a look before she spoke up quickly.

“No!” putting her flippers out on the car to make a metallic slapping noise, she glanced back at their habitat before looking back to Kowalski. “Er- no, sir!” She thought of Skipper’s decree that no should seldom leave her beak and felt embarrassed that she had uttered the word to each penguin now.

“Why not?” The highest bird in the bunch couldn’t wrap his mind around this secrecy. “All four of us know now, and it’s not like we _don’t_ allow women in our unit. There is no logical reasoning not to tell Skipper.”

“I don’t want to be treated differently,” Jo said, before continuing. “I’m fine with being challenged and put through the wringer as the lowest rung, but after seeing how Skipper…”

“You do have a point.” Kowalski did indeed understand, thinking back to some of the less than respectful terms he had squawked referencing the opposite gender.

“Vroom.” Rico started pushing the car again, remembering their time limit before the zoo opened. Private started helping the two others push in the back, as Kowalski walked next to them, writing on his clipboard. 

“So will you…?” Jo was getting antsy as they approached the garage port, leading to the base. Kowalski continued writing but glanced at the two who had decided to help her push the car and keep the secret.

“I needed to see the options.” He had been drafting various scenarios, of which only two—5% of outcomes—didn’t involve something bad happening to any of the men or singular woman. “Skipper _is_ irrational when it involves the female of _any_ species. Therefore, I have concluded that it is in our best and logical interest not to mention it.”

Jo was in awe as she stopped shoving the car to turn to Kowalski. Conditioned by Private she thanked him by giving him a hug. Instead of hugging her back, he grabbed her shoulders to put some distance between them as the others turned to watch while pushing with their backs.

“I am still vastly your superior.” He postulated, reminding her of her rank and keeping a professional boundary, unlike Private. “This is for the benefit of the team and Skipper, not just a favor for you.”

“Yes, sir.” She stated, trying not to sound too upset at the cold reaction.

“Speaking of _favors_ …” The scientist continued walking, and she regained her place to push the car she’d crashed. “Once you finish repairing this damage, see me in the lab for an assignment.”

“That’s not a favour then, it's an order!” Private corrected, a bit miffed at Kowalski.

“Precisely.” The haughty bird went back to finish the calculations for the mission ahead. Private and Jo looked to Rico who gave them a shrug as the port opened.

The group made it inside just in time, and the sophisticated officer did his part by pushing a button to close the port as the zoo opened. Inside the garage, Rico slipped to grab tools for repair, when Private tapped his arm.

“We can’t worry ‘bout that now. It’s time for _the_ feeding.” Private and Rico started to slip off, Jo following just behind them. Kowalski had continued down the tunnel.

“ _The_ feeding?” Jo questioned as they slid.

“It’s when we do our cute and cuddly routine to earn fish from the zoo visitors!” Private was looking forward to it.

“Fiiish?” Rico nudged Jo as they were almost finished with the length of the tunnel. Private noticed her questioning look and filled in the context.

“Rico wants to know if he can take your fish.” Private sighed. “Whatsit come to, ignoring then stealing from a woman-”

As if to slap the bird instead of the other three penguins nearby the little Brit, he smacked into the door. Jo reached out, helping the small bird get back up before nodding yes to Rico.

“Fiiiiiiish~!” He sang, beautifully.

Skipper heard the door open, finding himself belly to the ceiling on a top shelf in the lab as he struggled with dangerous electrical wires. Blast, he hadn’t expected his men to be back so soon. Only, it wasn’t soon.

The device Kowalski had made for him to keep time had busted during the crash, stating the same time ever since. He hid the wiring behind a tile and rolled off the shelf, lightly slapping a beaker that had dared wobble and teeter on the ledge.

Their Captain came through the lab door, and the five birds met in the center of HQ. The second in command flipped through the evidence on his clipboard, but the others rushed everyone up and out, getting Skipper up to speed on the new time.

Above, it was a wonderland as the guests surrounded the exhibit, bags full of delightful fish to replace the keeper’s feeding and make money for the zoo. The men each had a different style of performing.

Private waddled around, holding a flipper to his beak as his tail feathers wagged endearingly. Rico ramped off of the feeding dish in order to do a dive. Skipper swam on his back like an expert, in sync with the rhythm of the ripples Rico had made. Kowalski bobbed his head, before hopping down to a lower ledge and flapping his arms, pleading with the guests for a meal.

Jo was left to think of a new way to move, and she flopped down to the ledge, sliding around the plateau before rolling gently into the cascading waters. Porpoising next to Rico, he nodded, moving in front as a fish was tossed her way.

This routine continued, and she was losing stamina. Now she understood some of the more questionable stances they had trained for. It wasn’t all about fighting, their sense of style had to be practiced to maintain.

“Get ready to fall in line up top.” Skipper caught up with the pair in the water, clueing the rookie into the final step in the feeding.

Following Skipper and Rico, Jo launched from the water with a strong push of her webbed feet. The five then wagged and smiled, waving their flippers as the audience bestowed a rather large pile of fish to conclude the public feeding.

The crowd dispersed, and the penguins began savoring their haul. Rico nudged a few tuna towards Jo, wondering why she wasn’t eating. What kind of penguin wouldn’t be able to tell types of fish apart?

Closing her eyes to avoid looking at the unprepared food, she swallowed them carefully since the scales were rather dangerous if pointed the wrong way.

When the coast was clear, they took the rest of the food down the hatch, saving it for later. Kowalski returned to his abandoned evidence, and the three enlistees watched the officers converge.

Skipper saw the others that had yet to be given orders since the change of today’s plans. He addressed them as he and Kowalski stood under the stark light in the center of the room.

“Rico, make sure Joe fixes that car. I want it back up and running ASAP.” Skipper said, and the pair saluted and started on their way before Skipper glanced at Private. “Why don’t you join them? Show that newbie who’s boss.” The young Corporal finally had someone else below him in rank, and the leader wanted him to remember his earned place in the team.

“Aye-aye Skipper.” Private lingered for a moment before looking at Kowalski, an action shared by the two others as they waited for the littlest penguin to come along.

It's all there, documented in some way on that clipboard, and they knew it came down to the choice the straight-laced scientist made now. Kowalski felt their eyes on him even after the tunnel door closed. 


	10. Matter of Principle

“I’ve finished collecting the information.” Kowalski crinkled the paper as he held the clipboard tight.

“All of it?” Skipper questioned.

“Yes, and I don’t believe we need to worry.” The ace analyst thought—at least not about Jo and Private—everyone should still worry about intergalactic space squid 24/7.

“Well?” The leader asked, imploring his own right-hand man to continue.

“The secret was related to a physical condition.” Kowalski really didn’t want to lie to Skipper, so he told a partial truth.

“A physical condition?” Skipper brought his head back in shock that the new recruit could be sick or worse. “Is it contagious?”

“I can say it is not with assured certainty.”

“Then why keep it under wraps?” Skipper put his flippers behind his back as he paced around the room. “More importantly, what did it have to do with me?”

“Apparently the new recruit thinks highly of your opinions, and worries that letting you know would just add another layer of separation from the rest of the team.” Kowalski summed it up carefully.

“He does, does he?” Skipper puffed up a little more, before looking back to Kowalski. “Good work Kowalski, I knew I could count on you to get to the bottom of this.”

The genius puffed up too, content that he was able to straddle the line and find a way to keep his word to everyone. He and Skipper still had a lot of work to do, recollecting the other calculations, and adjusting the schedule.

In the garage, Rico was showing Jo the basics of reconstructing the car. The recruit had worked out another deal with the other tall bird, a trade of teachings. In exchange for painting lessons to paint his Ms. Perky doll, he would show her how to repair the wheels, engine, and hood.

“Nuh-uh.” He grunted, coughing up another wrench to show the proper technique. It was Rico’s craft, knowing how to take things apart meant understanding how to put them back together.

Private sat on the counter, hoping that everything would work out. It was great, watching Jo and Rico get along. It still took a while, but working together the car was finished in record time, and they had started to chat and tell old stories to the new girl.

“You should’ve seen the look on Skipper’s face when the popcorn started flooding our headquarters!” Private giggled, wagging his feet as he dangled on the edge of the workstation.

“Yap!” Rico nodded, agreeing that the humongous pile of popped corn that rained from the sky was a great event. Finding out his favorite snack was caused by mini exploding seeds had made him gleeful.

At the sound of the garage door opening, the three birds stood at attention, making a line from tallest to shortest as Skipper came in.

“At ease boys.” He waved his flipper as he inspected the car. It seemed fixed, and he trusted that it was up to Rico’s code. The leader was tired after discussing the next week's overview with his lieutenant. Slapping the hood he made sure it wasn’t just smoke and mirrors. “Good as new. Looks like you’re off the hook.”

“Yes sir.” She said, meekly. Even though the order was to be at ease, she still didn’t know if Kowalski mentioned anything and-“Kowalski!”

“What?” Skipper questioned, wondering if the recruit had mixed up their names again.

“He said to see him in the lab after fixing the car.” She was getting nervous about being so late. Skipper took note of Joe’s panic and realized he was waiting to be allowed to leave.

“Go ahead, rookie! When I say _at ease_ you don’t need to wait for a dismissal!” She turned to rush off but hesitated, saluting with the wrong flipper before quickly changing it and hurrying off down the exit.

The three watched Jo(e) go, before sharing a moment of exasperation at the odd encounter. Still, it was clear to Skipper that learning was in progress. Why, he remembered some mishaps back with Manfredi and Johnson that gives him second-hand embarrassment to this day.

“Gentlemen, I’ve had a long day… and would like nothing more than to enjoy Shirtless Ninjas the Movie Three with the both of you.” It was a long way to say he cared, but the message was received loud and clear by Rico and Private.

“Oh goody! That’s the one with the boat scene!” Private sclapped his flippers and Rico coughed up some bowls to fill. They had started saving kernels to add it to their snack storage, now that they knew how to make the salty, buttery snack.

“Popcorn!” He smiled and started waddling with the other two. 

“Indeed Rico.” Skipper slapped his sergeants back before looking to the Corporal.

“How are you enjoying your new position?”

“Oh, it’s quite lovely!” Private thought, before adding, “I don’t really feel much differn't myself.”

“That’s a good thing.” Skipper smiled. “Sometimes power can go right to your head.”

“Mmhm.” Rico made a knocking noise with a curled flipper on the side of his skull.

“Skipper?”

“Yes?”

“How do you feel, as the leader of our unit?” Private knew his captain took pride in keeping this unit in mint condition, but it must have its own unseen downsides.

“It’s rewarding.” He answered, bonding with them as they waddled along. 

“Don’t get me wrong, it is _a lot of work_ , but seeing how far you men have come from where you began, and seeing how much further you still have to go… It’s worth more than the tangiest fish of the sea.” Skipper’s love of leading came out like a spoken song from the heart. 

“Blegh.” Rico wasn’t enjoying this sappiness, but it made Private glad.

They made their way into the main room, booting up the movie and cooking the food in the furnace as they got situated for a men’s night in.

In that time, Jo had rushed off and slipped into the lab, out of breath from the chase against a clock. Then again, she didn’t _have_ to rush since Kowalski had no way of knowing at what point she had finished fixing the car, but it would have bothered her regardless.

“You had an assignment for me, Sir?” She asked as Kowalski sat at his desk, looking into a microscope and jotting down information. There was a long pause, and she felt like he hadn’t heard her. “Sir? You said-“

“Give me one moment.” His reply was concise, but it made her shudder from interrupting.

She could hear the scratches of the pencil on the board and didn’t make another sound until he got up, motioning for her to come to sit in his place at the table.

Avoiding eye contact, it was the tensest she had felt since her arrival, but she came over and sat at the desk. Kowalski flipped a new page on his clipboard before addressing her.

“Look into the microscope and make a rendering. Then, I want a diagram made following my instructions.”

He sounded like a recorded voice... As if he could start explaining that the fitness gram pacer test is a multistage aerobic capacity test that progressively gets more difficult as it continues.

To be honest, this assignment felt like a pacer test for an artist, as she looked back and forth to make the rendering for the scientist. He kept to himself, going over to another station while she worked.

When the rendering was finished, she couldn’t help but smile after being so tense for so long. Especially when the rendering was shaped like a handlebar mustache.

“I mustache you a question.” She held the art in front of her face so it lined up. Apparently, the lab was the place where humor died. Or was absorbed into the walls and dissipated, as the others enjoying their movie came through as muffled laughter.

Seeing the rookie sadly deflate after hearing the laughs, some part of Kowalski determined it may be okay to entertain some lightheartedness.

“Are you going to ask me now, or _shave_ it for later?” He came over, setting the odd purple liquid concoction he was working on in the beaker stand next to various other mixtures and emulsions. 

The atmosphere remained a bit tense, but considering he rarely ever made any jokes it was definitely some sort of improvement.

“Well, sir, I was actually wondering what the context was for this illustration. This seems like a weird assignment.” She was planning on drawing feathers and other more pleasant scientific renderings.

“This is a rendering of a fly’s foot,” Kowalski explained, before spinning the microscope around to double-check her work. Rising up, he pointed to the bottom corner of the left side, where it was a little unclear. “There is supposed to be an indication made of how the pads underneath connect to the shaft of the leg.”

She went to check it again, accidentally bumping into the bird and pushing him away from the microscope instead of turning it to face her. Pulling back, she felt clumsy as her broad form felt more cumbersome than usual.

“Apologies, sir, I didn’t mean to…”

“Calm down, I’m not as much of a stickler for the rules as you may have presumed.” He shook his head and spoke with a flipper lifted. “Though, I do prefer a more professional environment than Rico or Private.”

“Understandable, sir.” She took another look in the microscope, leaving it at that before making the edit to the rendering. Kowalski took another look, before pointing to the image again.

“Remove the hairs, they won’t be necessary for this documentation.” He rose back to full height, putting his flippers behind himself as the lower rank followed his command. 

After a while, it became apparent that the scientist was determined to have explicitly detailed renderings made for several parts of an invention designed to be deployed to walk up walls and across ceilings easier than their old plunger shoe setup.

“I’ll call it, the Stick-u-lator!” He smiled, looking at the draft.

“Ah, that implies the stickiness of the chemical reaction to make the glue compound, the _you_ referencing the penguin using the invention, and the -ator suffix is reminiscent of elevator!”

“You like the name?” Kowalski was shocked, considering Skipper usually changed what to call the inventions to something simpler. “Also, the -ator suffix _actually_ refers to the machine aspect, which is why it is so common in names for inventions.”

“I think it is a great name. All I could come up with was Must-aschends.” She had started labeling the model sheet for the invention, while Kowalski was given a taste of his own medicine as he thought of the derivative for the proposed name.

“Mustachends?” He curled a flipper under his beak in thought. “How do you figure?”

“Mustache for the shape, and ascend for the purpose, combined because they are used when we _must ascend_.” 

Kowalski now knew why the others didn’t appreciate his nomenclature for inventions. It took a while to understand, and might never be should one not know all the vocabulary. While Jo went about detailing the mock-up on paper, his mind kicked into high gear.

It was a bit suspicious, for another penguin to have any sort of knowledge related to science. Immediately he thought back to Skipper’s warning that Jo could be a spy, and realized he had given her access to his lab—his top-secret inventing space—unsupervised.

“You seem to know an awful lot about my line of work.”

“What?” She took a pause from her work to look up at the superior officer.

“Do you have a background in science? Physics? Chemistry?” Jo looked at the vials and tubes throughout the lab as she thought, gazing back to the debonair detective.

“No, not chemistry or advanced physics… but I enjoy biological studies and learning about why things work. Anatomy ties into art, and there is a lot of crossover between the fields.” She thought back to what Private said, and parroted his words to the bird. “There’s a reason my art studio is right at home in your lab.”

Kowalski nodded, sorting through the information just given to him, before deciding it was still irregular but nothing to bring to Skipper’s attention—or corkboard—just yet. 

Instead, he would take precautions to put away certain inventions when he wasn’t around and keep an eye on her proceedings just in case this did turn out to be a threat to the team.


	11. Ratification

The three others had ended up not only watching Shirtless Ninja Warriors Three, but also One,Two, Two-and-a-Half, and Three-Quarters the Final Act in a marathon of macho mayhem.

Meanwhile, though there were moments of solace with talking to Kowalski about sciences and discussing knowledge, Jo was at her wits’ end when it came to the edits being requested from the slightly mad genius.

In the end, she boiled it down to getting this one invention perfected, and understood that it was imperative to ensuring the safety of the unit that this was all rendered to a high degree.

“Sir…” The exhausted artist was about to make a request for a break, when fate would have it that Skipper joined them in the lab to see what they had gotten up to during his night off with the others.

“New invention?” Skipper looked over the model sheet, trying not to come across as overly impressed. “…the Stick-u-lator?” He was about to suggest a simpler name, when Jo spoke up.

“Yes!” Even though she was tired, she wanted to support the clever name. It was when the two highest in command looked at her that she piped down and stayed out of their way. Skipper made a gesture of dismissal, and she went over to her art studio to wrap up for the evening.

Loosening up after the mental and artistic marathon, she grabbed a slip of paper and started loosely sketching Kowalski. His portrait gave her the most trouble the first time around, but now there was no pressure to make it perfect. Nobody had to look in her sketchbook.

After a while of debating over the invention, Skipper decided to let the name stick, and gave Kowalski the go-ahead to start making the actual device. The pair joined the others in the main room, and with a quick look towards the sealed lab door Skipper looked at his men.

“I’ve come to the decision that, well, when it comes to the rookie I _may_ have been a little too paranoid about him.”

“Her.” Kowalski corrected, before the three stares brought to his attention the correction would need corrected quickly. “ _Her_ meneutically speaking, I think this time around your paranoia was well placed.”

“What do you mean Kowalski?” Private asked, finding their friendship on thinner ice than usual.

“While this may not be as high priority as The Red Squirrel, I am making note of a few more discrepancies.”

“Why can’t anyone give the benefit of the doubt?” Private put his flippers on the table as Rico backed him up this time.

“The benefit of the doubt is a _weak scam_ to let suspicious folks walk under the radar.” Skipper glanced at Rico and Private before turning to Kowalski and continuing. “How about the detriment of certainty? We can open this can of tuna right now if it’s a threat.”

“I’m not certain. Yet.” Kowalski ignored Private and Rico’s stares, as he tried to cool Skipper down from any late night rash decisions. “We need to build a case.”

“Exactly.” Skipper kicked the whiteboard, revealing the conspiracy cork board kept on the back of it.

“What?” Private pointed at the copy of his portrait. “Whatchu got me on there for?”

“Well _gov’ner_ …” Skipper mocked the adorable fake accent Private used, rescinding some of the bond they had built earlier in the evening. “You were added since it seems Joe is closest to you. Close enough to share his deepest secrets with.” Private looked to Kowalski and then to Rico, wondering what had happened with the men he trusted the most.

“You told him?”

“About Jo’s _non-contagious physical condition_?”Kowalski sternly questioned, hoping Private would understand. Rico’s snickering caused the birds to shift their attention to him before Skipper spoke again.

“Yes, I’m aware it’s embarrassing but whatever disease plagues him now won’t get in the way of a penguin fitting into our unit.” He thought of his group and their quirks, from Rico’s psychotic tendencies to Private’simmaturity and Kowalski’s misplaced ego. Besides, Skipper himself knew a thing or two about classifying information to conform to his role as their macho leader.

“I’m making a ruling that while _Operation: Leery Theory_ is still a go, I want to see some genuine fellowship.”

The ruling included the penguins not forgetting their fellowship with each other. After all, if it only took one more penguin added to the mix to ruin their dynamic, what kind of unit were they? Skipper had faith in his men, that their bond would not be broken so easily.

As Kowalski headed for the lab to shut away his materials for the night, he butted right into Private. The pair looked at each other, before starting to speak at the same time.

“What do you need from my lab?” 

“I wanted to check on the assignment you _ordered_.”

The two put their differences aside, and Kowalski nodded to let Private into the sanctity of his lab, following the Corporal over to the walled off art studio. There, Jo seemed to be resting on the table, her flippers hiding her eyes from the light as her forehead pressed on the edge.

Coming up to see what she had gotten up to, there were various little doodles of swirling designs, and a couple of sketches of Kowalski laying about. The studio was starting to get a little messy, but otherwise orderly.

“Is that what you wanted? Another portrait?”Private asked the intellectual. 

Upon hearing Private’s voice, Jo shot up to look back, noticing the two inspecting her unfinished work. It was always a fear for her as an artist for someone to look in her private sketchbooks.

After explaining it was just for practice, and showing Private the real assignment while Kowalski put away his various equipment, all three left the lab to find Rico and Skipper getting ready for bed.

“Night!” The bird of few words kissed Ms. Perky’s cheek before growling and raising his feathered brows. At last, the five were safe in their bunks with a new semblance of routine since the inclusion of a new bird.

It wasn’t always a walk in the park, even when the unit was literally walking in central park. There were times where Skipper would run the birds ragged with training, or get upset at lack of progress with the rookie.

Overall, though, she was getting used to the banter of the group. A month seemed to fly past the flightless birds, ever since Kowalski made his oath to stop mucking about with time after several close calls of destroying the space-time continuum.

Skipper was repulsed at the state of the art studio, noticing a thick layer of dust from the exposed concrete walls, and several dangerous set-ups that were not up to code.

It seemed they had forgotten to add that section of HQ to the cleaning routine, but it only took a few hours for the artist to clean it and the room was added to regular scheduled maintenance.

Finally, the training was starting to pay off, and after about 40 days Skipper let the newest private recruit on their first group mission instead of staying back from the front to focus on the prep-work and artistic aspects in missions.

As the group was on their way to add a Jacuzzi upgrade to a section of their habitat in preparation for the winter, the flamboyant voice of an alligator caught their attention.

“Oh it’s just terrible, terrible!”

“Roger?” Skipper turned from his position at point of the team, jumping up to the ledge of the habitat of the gentle green giant. The others followed his lead and stood in order of rank.

“All my water is gone! It was here just this morning and—hey! Who’s your friend?” He addressed the new inclusion.

“Kowalski, analysis.” Skipper ordered, efficiently starting to solve the issue as he answered the question. “Roger, meet Joe. He’s your average everyday artist, and the newest member of our unit.”

“What a joy it must be to make art every day.” Roger had been calmed a bit by imagining how much singing helped him calm his nerves, but Skipper brought him back to attention as Kowalski performed tests on the mud left in the habitat. “You know, that’s why I took up singing. See, before I was flushed I would-“

“Skipper, I believe there has been a catastrophic water shortage caused by lack of pressure in the Zoo’s main water lines.” Kowalski cut off Roger’s long winded life story.

“We haven’t even started implementing your invention yet!” The leader poked fun at the analyst, who always seemed to cause more problems than solutions when it came to inventing. “What gives?”

“Unclear.” Kowalski got out his sonar device to access their information on the water lines they had collected some 15 days prior. “We will need to do a recon sweep to determine the cause.”

“Alright men, move out!” Skipper pointed to the slow drip pipe that would usually be submerged in the habitat’s pool. While his team started following Kowalski down into the darkness, the leader quipped to Roger. “See you later, alligator!”

“Well that’s not a very nice thing to say!” Roger watched the birds leave, shaking his head at the commando leader.

Skipper caught up, allowing Kowalski to continue leading with the sonar of the pipes as a map. It was spooky as they descended into the larger sewer to fallow the water main.

“Rats.” Kowalski muttered, stopping in his tracks. He caused a minor pileup as the others bumped into each other behind him. Rico and Private awkwardly looked at Jo before returning to the mission at hand. She felt singled out for a moment until Skipper rushed to the head to see what the hold up was.

“Rats!” Skipper yelled, his voice echoing down as the flashlight flooded the space, revealing the flooding sewer as steam cleared to show the cause of the issue. A giant mutated rat had been piercing the water lines.

“Birds!” The buff big cheese turned his attention to the group, yanking out the tool he was using to destroy the pipes.

“Have you gone mad? Flooding the sewer will destroy your home as well as ours!” Kowalski protested the Rat leader, as his tinier lackeys started making a battle formation.

“We won’t call this place home by this time tomorrow.” The rat clued them into his plan. “Once the workers come down we get the keys, take control of the upper level, and blow this dump.”

“Yeah! Instead of eating garbage we will dine in style from the water treatment facility vending machines, eh!” A small rat squeaked out, causing the other rodents to start yelling in unison.

“Rico, duct-tape! Kowalski, Joe, Private, get in formation and be my anchors. _Operation: Web Weaver_ is a go!”

The scarred bird hocked up the end of a roll of duct tape, and Skipper snatched it before deploying a pair of new Stick-u-lator boots to climb up the wall of the sewer. While Kowalski took the far right of the tunnel, Jo took the left,leaving the shortest Private to hold thecenterofthe tape low as the entire group ran towards the army of vermin.

The first line of rats were immediately trapped by the sticky tape, and the penguins stuck them to the wall as more tape rolled out from the bird at the end of the line.

By the time they were finished running on the rats, most of them had retreated including the big leader. Of course, Skipper knew that big rat was nothing but a coward when it came to fighting, but as he stood on the ceiling he addressed the penguins below.

“Fixed two issues with one roll of tape.” The rats had been taped to the busted pipes, and tactically positioned to plug up the holes. It wasn’t a permanent solution but would last until the workers came to do the real repairs. “I say it’s time for snowc-ooooooONES!”

“Rats.” Private sadly said as the four on the ground watched as their leader’s boots failed due to the glue compound interacting with some unknown cleaning substance that had found its way into the sewer. They all sprung into action to rescue their Captain during a downstream sewer chase.

Later, in HQ, Skipper sat in a makeshift hot-tub, a towel on his head, and a scowl on his face.


	12. Mandatory Fun

While Kowalski finished setting up the controls for the hot-tub, Jo was documenting the mistake caused by lack of a fail-safe in the design of the Stick-u-lator boots.

“There was a flaw in the curve of the claw hooks to either side of the sticky pads.” The tallest bird looked over the artist’s shoulder, as he had figured it out as soon as Skipper fell from the sewer roof.

“I had added the curve before…” She brought it up, remembering the alteration he had requested that changed the hook design.

The scientist and artist had started arguing again, before Kowalski asserted his rank to quiet any sort of questioning related to his edits. Skipper had taken note of how that madman was running the other ragged.

“Lay off a little Kowalski!” Skipper chided, using his authority as he shivered in the tub. Thinking back to day one, he was racking his mind for a solution to the sour air among the men.

“Thank you Sir, I-“ Jo had started showing her appreciation to Skipper, when he snapped back.

“He is still second in command, so stop your back-talking when it comes to disagreements with his assignments.”

She backed off, holding her art clipboard as a shield once again, and avoiding eye contact with the others. Skipper had no idea what a struggle it was to make edits constantly. Little changes that added up, that she had no choice but to make at the whim of the perfectionist.

Had this been a volunteer job, Kowalski would be on her artistic blacklist.

Everything came to a head the next morning, when a small squabble over a minor issue made everyone argue at breakfast. Skipper slammed his mug on the table to get everyone’s attention.

“That does it.” He commanded. “We all have plenty of rest days, and it’s high time we took the load off.”

“But Skipper, the agenda for today is-“ Kowalski cycled through his clipboard but stopped when the leader put up a flipper to stop him.

“Forget the agenda.” Skipper put a leg up on his seat authoritatively. Ignoring the squeal from the analyst he gave new orders. “Today I am enforcing fun. It is mandatory we all enjoy some _well earned_ R&R.”

He didn’t have to tell Rico or Private twice, as the men rushed off. Kowalski shook his head with a small sigh, remarking as he waddled to his lab. “I’ll do some light research and shift all of our plans forward one day—not like anything was _time-sensitive_ …” He added, sarcastically.

Jo was on her way to the freshly slammed lab door, when Skipper spoke up.

“Joe.” 

“Sir!” The penguin squeaked out, standing at attention with a quick salute.

“At ease, man.” Skipper smiled, putting his foot down gently to waddle around the table and continue speaking. “I’m giving you an order to call me Skipper for the rest of the day.”

“The rest of the day, Skipper?” It felt weird to call the commander by name, even if his name was also another term for his rank.

“Sure!” The chunky bird plapped her back gently to motion towards the ladder. “Let’s walk and talk. _Assuming_ you’re not too busy.” He let the rookie know it wasn’t an order, but a request.

In the lab, Kowalski finished placing all of his experiments back in their holding facilities, and although disgruntled he edited the agenda. Maybe he _was_ overworked, and _could_ use a break, but when on the verge of scientific greatness it made him upset to have to press the pause button.

When a giggle and a rattle of paper came from the art studio, he could have molted all of his feathers at once. 

“Jo! I thought you were…” He started trying to put together how she had followed him to the lab so silently, when he noticed Private taking some papers off of her desk. “Private? What are you doing?”

“Oh, I was just picking up some… art requests.” The little Brit replied, and as Kowalski came forth he smoothed himself out.

“What kind of art requests?” Kowalski knew she did art for everyone, but lately it seemed like she only ever really worked with his invention schematics.

Private was about to come up with an excuse, when the big bird snatched the paper to look it over.

“Of course. Jo can draw a _Lunacorn_ to the nth degree of detail but _not_ a subdivided molecule?” Kowalski sighed, and Private felt his heart sink. Jo was the only member of the team who actually enjoyed watching and discussing the show with him.

“That’s it!” Private had been getting more upset with Kowalski, and this was his chance to put it all on the table. “I’m tired of you always going aroundwith your beak in the air thinking you’re better than everyone else!”

Kowalski was flabbergasted.

“Wha-I don’t _think_ I’m better than everyone else!” The scientist loomed over the other. “I can scientifically prove it!” He started scribbling before Private jumped up to lower the board.

“See? Right there.” Private was losing a little steam. “Sure, we all know how smart you are, but it all means nothing if you use it to keep others down.”

“Keep others down?” Kowalski put the clipboard on the table, literally opening up the discussion. “I always intend for my inventions to lift others up, metaphorically—unless it is an invention designed to lift in which case-“

“I’m not talking about your inventions!” Private put his arms up to stop the other from speaking. “You use your smarts as a way to boss us around!”

Private gained a second wind as he chewed out his superior, the second lowest rank not considering the repercussions. He continued yelling, loud enough that Rico was almost able to hear all the way in the garage.

“None of us can understand you most of the time, and you have started a rift with Jo over rank.” Private teared up, before backing off. “It’s not easy being the lowest rung on the ladder. I was for so long…”

The scientist didn’t need a clipboard to realize the huge mistake he had made. Out of all of the miscalculations…

“I apologize.” He said, simply, before continuing in layman’s terms for the first time in what seemed like a month. “I’m sorry.”

“I knew what that meant.” Private wiped an eye with his free flipper, smiling up at Kowalski.

While they mended their own rift, the scientist whipped up some delicious experiments he had been working on. Even if he didn’t like peanut butter, he started developing an elixir to increase the taste of Private’s favorite treat by 110 percent.

Above, in the mellow early light of the closed zoo, Skipper leisurely waddled alongside Joe. There was still an element of nervous respect between them, apparent as the Captain spoke.

“Are you enjoying your recruitment?”

“Yes Sir—Skipper!” She reeled her head back as the blubber created a small nest for her face to hide in. “I’m grateful to have become a part of your team…”

“The team is grateful for your services.” Skipper nudged the possessive term out, seeing Joe was still focused on holding him as a leader in the highest regard. “…but what about outside of work?”

“Outside of work…?” She thought, before thinking of how much she enjoyed helping the others. “I’ve been having fun teaching Rico how to paint, and making Lunacorn fan art for Private.”

“What about outside of art-work?” Skipper had noticed Rico’s improvements, but he wondered if there were any other pastimes.

“I…” She felt like this was becoming an interrogation. “There isn’t much I’d rather do.” 

Skipper made a small hum, as the conversation came to an awkward standstill. While it may have felt like an interrogation to her, after some time most of the suspicions had been sunk to the bottom of the paranoid bird’s mind. Now he wondered if his gut instinct—while still not wrong—was about another aspect of the newest team member…

Jo posed a question to him, wanting to bring a conversation back around, and accidentally breaking his train of thought.

“Marlene said you play the Spanish Guitar… How long have you been practicing?” She noticed his demeanor change as her words buffed his inapparently fragile ego to a shine.

“She did?” He smiled, putting his arms behind him and puffing up. “I learned from spending 8 years in the jungles of Mexico, dodging danger and strumming chords…” The Captain reminisced. “Course, I also play the accordion, the fiddle, and a few others I’ll keep up my sleeve for now.”

“I’ve heard a lot of stories from the others.” Jo smiled, remembering the good, the weird, and the crazy… but overall his men really did care deeply for their Skipper.

The pair continued, out of the zoo, unaware of the striped king watching them waddle on.

“Look at them Maurice.” Julien was standing on his throne, sipping an early day smoothie the aye-aye had whipped up.

“I see em.” He replied, already exhausted.

“But are you seeing them the way I see them?” Maurice sighed as the penguins disappeared from view past the walls of the zoo.

“Let me guess, you still think that Joe is a woman?” The lackey was forced to entertain whatever insane notion his king thought on a whim.

“Yes, because I know.” Julien jumped down from his high horse and tossed what was left of his drink, splashing Maurice in the process. “Come, let us follow their date.”

“What?” The already upset aye-aye wiped his fur as he tried to wrap his mind around this new plan for the morning. “Your majesty, I’m pretty sure you’re reading a little too much into this.”

“How could that be? I cannot read.” Julien rebuked his henchman, as another smaller lemur ran up to grasp at his leg.

“Yay! I’m illiterate also!” With a hearty kick, the lemur king launched him sky high over the wall, shattering a new Mort-kicking record. “Ahhhhhh!”

The penguins ignored the scream, as it became a perfect example of the doppler effect as the lemur sailed over them and landed among the squirrels. Skipper continued telling a story from his point of view.

“In fact, that huge, _muhungalunga_ of a fish was plaguing this very lake.” With a wave of his flipper, he gestured at the water. Recalling the explosion of sashimi that fed them for days, he nodded. “I wonder if there are any food carts out this morning.”

“Wouldn’t we need the rest of the team?”

“We can handle it.” Skipper kept sweeping the park visually, until he spotted the glimmer of the metal reflecting the sun. “Snowcones at 2 o’clock!”

Unlike the first few times, thinking the leader was speaking of what time to move out, Jo now knew immediately where the cart was in relation to their position. Sliding on the grass she followed Skipper’s signal to mirror him to the left as they surrounded the objective.

Skipper waited for a moment longer, before doing a fancy flip, corkscrew, and bound off of the cart, successfully snagging two snow cones. Jo held them as he daringly repeated the action to pay the stand with the change he had nonchalantly collected on the way here. It was incredible to witness, especially after being inspired by his own storytelling.

Once the duo found a recess in the grass, they were able to enjoy the icy snack while looking out over the water. As Jo started worrying about the time and when the zoo would open, Skipper showed her how to chart the hours using the position of the sun. This was considerably hard to do with only flippers.

They grabbed the empty cone wrappers as they prepared to make their way back, when a certain kingly voice boomed from a nearby shrub.

“No. Off the feet!” As a ringed tail peeped out from the foliage, the voice got angrier. “We did not come outing here to look for you!”

“Woooah!” Mort rolled out of the bush, landing upside down at Skipper’s feet. Looking up at the ruffled penguin, he waved. “Hello! I’m a nuisance!”

“Ringtail!” Skipper barked, as Jo started backing away. Most of the stories told had emphasized the less-than-friendship relations between their Captain and the self-proclaimed King. “What is the meaning of your espionage?”

“Oh, no. What you are smelling is my natural musk.” Julien wiggled his brows at the bird, clearly not understanding what espionage was. Maurice came out of the bush after him, leaves crudely taped to his head. Julien winked at Jo before moving closer to Skipper. “I notice you finally took that lady penguin out for once~”

“Smoked ham, man!” The flat penguin felt his blood pressure rise 60 points. “We are having a _manly outing_!”

“An outing for snow cones, which I’m recalling was my first date with _Marlene,_ ” Julien made an aside towards Maurice. “Drives them wild, you know.”

“That was _not_ a date either!” Skipper felt a pang of jealousy at the mammal’s mention of the non-date with the otter woman. He signaled for Jo to get a move on, attempting to ditch the peanut gallery as they made their way home.

“So quick to get back to bossing the other penguins around.” Julien pushed Skipper’s buttons on the way back, as they both ignored his antics. “If you were lemurs you would be loving a _lady_ as a leader-or else!”

“Your Majesty, wouldn’t that make you-“ Maurice tried to stop his King but received a tail to the face instead.

“Not now Maurice.” He paused, as the penguins walked on. “Actually can you make that not ever? My schedule is pretty full.”

Performing slick evasive maneuvers the lemurs were unable to follow, the penguins slipped away to bask in the shade while floating in the moat of their habitat. The fishy smell was thankfully enough to keep Julien at bay.

“You really don’t like him _at all_?” Jo commented, noticing Skipper’s distain still present. It still made her wonder about the few times the men had told her about them working together.

“Julien?” Skipper shook his head, speaking from experience. “That lemur has _no idea_ what he’s talking about. He could talk about nonsense for hours and still never see any sense.”

While the two pairs of penguins enjoyed most of their morning, barring a heated argument and the lemur escapade, one penguin of few words had enjoyed every moment. Rico placed the fresh painting of Ms. Perky on the garage wall next to several others, each better than the last as he improved.


	13. Good Initiative, Bad Judgement

More time had elapsed since those summer days when the new penguin had been thrown into the mix. The holiday festivities seemed to come and go like a tidal wave of cheer. It was a wonderful sight to see how the entire zoo transformed for the children, both human and animal, just to spread joy and grant wishes.

It was during the coming months, when the weather was still cold and mud started mixing with snow while everything waited to thaw that the melancholic atmosphere started gnawing at the birds’ mental health.

Jo in particular found these days rather bleak, and she had lived with the others for four and a half months. Over this time, a strong friendship grew with Private, as she understood what the others wrote off as immature. 

Instead, she listened to him and in return he gave her advice for various duties, Skipper’s quirks and punishments, military jargon and information, and keeping a lookout for any issues that could arise.

Another odd sort of friendship that arose was with Rico. She appreciated his unspoken wisdom, seeing the method to his presumed madness, and she learned a lot of street smarts from the rugged bird.

His paintings had come a long way, too. In fact, Skipper had asked if he wanted to join Jo(e) in the art’s and crafts division of their unit (which was now a legitimate name for it and not a snide comment), but the bird shook his head. Rather, the only subject he really wished to depict was his one and only Ms. Perky. 

For the resident artist, there was never a single subject lingered upon too long. The HQ was brighter since the landscape painting was added to the wall, and she had given Skipper a present of a full figure dapper cowboy penguin painting since he really didn’t ask for many favors himself.

This was a direct contrast to the second in command, who even after all this time and seemingly taking Private’s words to heart, didn’t quite grasp how his constant nitpicking edits were taking their toll. Over and over, with each passing invention, a little more of her artistic strength was wearing out.

Now, with the chilly dank days ahead, and on a particularly gray day, she moped around in her studio. As she sat burnt out from the most recent round of editing, Private patted her back softly.

“What’s the matter, Jo?” He asked with a small waver to his voice.

Sitting up a little, glancing around, and back to Private she made sure they were alone before saying anything.

“I know I can confide in you…” 

Her apprehensive tone, cautious glances, and forlorn eyes clued the tiny penguin into a revelation.

“I knew you had a crush on Kowalski!”

“What!?” She turned towards Private, brows slightly furrowed with her beak agape. “No!”

“Skipper, then?”

“Huh?”

“Hmm, Rico is a ladies man…”  Private went down the list, used to this process when he would have tea with Marlene before. 

“ If not Rico, then it must be me!” He chuckled nervously, before adding “Just kidding.” _Unless?_

“Would you cut it out?” She was a bit miffed at him. “Not every friendship has to lead to a romance just because I’m a girl.”

“Oh…” Private felt utterly embarrassed now, not to mention the fact Skipper still didn’t know the truth. Not that _that_ would change anything, but it was awfully rude of him to assume. “I wasn’t thinking of that.”

“Besides…” She saw him sadden, and wanted to lighten the mood, especially since today was so miserable in general. She did her best Skipper impression. “ _Inter-unit relationships are strictly forbidden especially after the banquet mishap of ’85_.”

Private started giggling at her pose and it cleared any tension between them as they both laughed about that old case file.

“Well, what did you want to tell me ‘bout Kowalski then?” Private rubbed an eye as he got back to business.

“How did you know it was about Kowalski?” She questioned. When the bird gave her a look of _who else would it be_ , she continued, “He has been running me through the ringer when it comes to edits…”

“I tried to warn him not to misuse his authority!” Private shook his head.

“It’s not about that, I’m fine with respecting his position.” She got up to stretch, tucking in her chair. “I just wish he would tell me what to change all at once so I can do it all in segments, not tiny fragments of information over an entire day.”

“Hm.” Private was thinking, not sure of what he could do. Looking at the floor, and the little claw scratches, he recalled their first sparring match and their conversation the day they met. “I could arrange a meeting, and mediate for you!”

“A meeting?”

“Yeah! I’ll set it up and we can work it out!” He cheered up, leaning forward and nodding excitedly. Jo was a bit apprehensive at the idea, but maybe it would be helpful.

“Thank you.” She came over to hug the other, who reciprocated with a smile, glad to have another hug loving penguin around.

The artist decided to take a short break, heading down to the garage to hang out with Rico while awaiting more orders from Skipper. Everything was slow these days, but Private was able to corner Kowalski coming out from the hidden elevator that led to their top secret areas of HQ.

“I’ve been looking everywhere-” The Brit had started coughing a bit, his voice sounding distinctly different, like a villain from a certain video game. With a whimper he touched a flipper to his beak. “Pardon, but I’ve been looking everywhere for you Kowalski!”

“Tyson’s necktie!” The scientist came over, quickly depressing Private’s tongue with a popsicle stick and looking down his throat. “No wonder, with a voice like that you _must_ be in pain!” Private pushed the concerned penguin away.

“Oh no, it was just a frog in me throat is all.” He anxiously glanced at the popsicle stick, trying to discern where it had come from.

“Then… what _did_ you need?” Kowalski asked, trying to be a bit more amicable to the young Corporal since their spat a while back.

“Well, you see, Jo wanted to arrange a meeting to talk to you about something that has been troubling for some time…” He started to explain, when he noticed the other flipping through his clipboard of notes.

“Hm, very well.” He rearranged some papers before speaking. “I’ll be in the lab. Was that all?”

“Um, yes, actually.” Private was astonished at how willing the scientist was to discuss issues with the lowest rank. After all, since the new penguin arrival it seemed that power had gone to his head exponentially.

Instead of slamming the laboratory door, Kowalski kept it open. Private peeped out of the hatch, not seeing Jo anywhere, but seeing their Captain walking around the perimeter of their habitat. Trying not to disturb Skipper, he shut the latch and headed for the garage, Kowalski glancing at the awkward shuffle of quickly slapping feet just outside the door. _That’s_ why he kept it closed most of the time.

From halfway down the tunnel to the garage, he heard Rico and Jo laughing. Upon entering, he watched as the pair played catch from either side of the vehicle.

“Jo!” He came up next to her, and Rico let him join in the game as he passed the regurgitated ball to him. Private passed it back in perfect tandem with the others.

“Hey Private!” She smiled wide, catching the ball and tossing it back. “Is it already time for the next _Lunacorns_ episode?” 

“This evening, yes-” The little bird nodded, catching and tossing the ball before adding “-but Kowalski is waiting for us now!”

“Woah!” Jo felt a panic wash over her, and Rico couldn’t stop the already thrown ball as it hit her arms held over her chest. “Already?”

“I was surprised too!” Private said, as Rico wavedthem on, finding the rolling ball and tossing it to his doll. The duo slid down the tunnel, and Private gently nudged her arm as reassurance. “Don’t be nervous, it’ll all work out.”

“I hope…” She was terrified, and didn’t like rocking the boat so to speak. So far, there were only a few occasions she spoke up to her superior, and each time she cringed in retrospect at the interaction.

Her panic rose as she rounded the corner, seeing the lab door open. Private motioned for her to take a breath, and it helped. Taking a small moment before waddling into the lab.

It was worse than the first time he had given her an assignment.

Kowalski took note of her demeanor as she came to sit across from him, Private off to their left. This moment of awkward hesitation lingered, before the scientist raised a flipper to start the conversation.

“Is this about your crush? I’m sorry, but my heart belongs to a dolphin named-”

“What!?” She wanted to crawl in a hole for fifty years. “No! Why would you even think that?”

“Propinquity, the standard cause.” He tapped his clipboard. “I also have several pieces of evidence to support my hypothesis if you really want me to digress…”

Private was in awe at Kowalski’s self-centeredness, but it was Jo who became the most fired up at these claims.

“I’m around you so often because my studio is in your lab, and I happen to love _science_ with all of my heart!” This only crossed off two of the thirty-seven pieces of evidence, but Kowalski wanted to get back to his work and shifted the topic forward.

“ _Fine_ , then what is this meeting about?” He made a mental note to put a quarter in the show-off jar. Private nodded at her in support.

“I don’t mean any disrespect, sir, and it has been wonderful working with you… but your edits-“ She got a little caught up in how she worded her complaint, “-they are ripping the life out of my art.”

Kowalski and Private gave each other a wide eyed look at that analogy, but she continued.

“It is very important to get them made, I know. I just would rather make a lot of changes at once instead of having you constantly pointing out flaws and fixes over my shoulder.” As she stopped speaking, she realized another silence would follow, and spoke more to fill the space. 

“Not that you _don’t_ have every reason to ask for the changes, or that I mind discussing the science behind why…“ Realizing it had been a bad choice to keep speaking, and unable to take back the double negative, she trailed off. 

“I just…”

“You just want me to compile my changes instead of pointing them out as they appear.” Kowalski finished her sentence correctly for once.

It sounded so simple, and he pondered why she hadn’t been able to ask over these months. The cause of all those arguments boiled down to a simple miscommunication.

The lab drew quiet, but Kowalski got up, placing a flipper on her shoulder.

“From now on I’ll do so.” With a glance at Private who seemed contented with the success of the meeting, he added, “You also have permission to _calmly_ bring these issues to my attention, I do make mistakes.” Most of their arguments were made worse by the rookie's temper... She would need to do better, but maybe it was time to turn over a new leaf when it came to the lab and working with him.

She smiled up at him, before a small chuckle from Private brought their attention to the Corporal as he teased Jo.

“See? No reason to be nervous!” He hadn’t even really needed to mediate.

“Nervous?” Kowalski turned back to Jo, raising a brow.

“I thought you wouldn’t want to listen, like the other times…” She brought her flippers up cautiously as Kowalski casually slid his clipboard under an arm.

“To someone with a love of science, I’ll gladly lend an ear.” The genius recalled the rift Private had mentioned, finally connecting the dots and offering non-invention related conversation. The confused Brit patted the side of his head.

“Do we have ears?” He knew he could hear and had ears per se, but hadn’t a clue how or if that was the proper word for them.

“Yes, just not the external conch that funnels sound. Our feathers obscure the opening to the middle ear on either side of the head.” Kowalski doodled a quick diagram, and Private noted that the scientist’s art had been subtly improving, too. 

“A great example of adaptation through evolution!” Jo beamed, relaxing in the lab for the first time as she thought of how penguins were designed to be perfect underwater travelers.

Once the two he sought to mediate had started talking about Darwin, discovery, and draftsmanship, Private was able to leave them to it. By the end of the day, the newest invention schematic was looking much better by comparison to all the others that had been fought over.

The artist’s analogy finally made sense as Kowalski and Private looked at the new work. Her heart was easily seen within the latest scientific renderings, and the littlest penguin was overjoyed to have helped build a bridge to this resolution.


	14. Moonbeam Boogie

Three months had passed since New Years Day, and the group had evolved into a super-organism that worked in sync with each other. Private was able to see Kowalski as a heroic role model once again, and the chasm between all of the ranks was slowly but surely being filled.

The change in the weather had made it better for not just the penguins, but the rest of the zoo civilians too. Marlene, Private, and Jo were able to swim in her habitat since the waters warmed. The otter lounged on the surface as she spilled some more zoo tea.

“Okay, but get this. Burt actually has a giant stash of peanuts hidden in the brick walls of his habitat!” Marlene whispered. “Some of them are imported, from France, Italy, Spain, and Brazil!”

“At least he isn’t hoarding _Brazil nuts_ …” Jo made a point, “They do crazy things to your psyche!”

“Oh goodness! Like the lycée nuts!?” Private floated in place as he brought up his flippers to either side of his beak.

“Exactly.” Jo nodded, remembering what the boys had told her of the night Julien, Maurice, and Mort went insane over spoiled food.

The trio was about to continue their gossiping, when a familiar gruff penguin hopped up to alert Jo and Private to a sudden emergency mission.

“Ahhh-hbbrlfgershh!” Rico was exasperated from running over at Skipper’s command, and immediately Private and Jo said farewell to Marlene to follow Rico to the source of the problem. Speaking of Burt and his secret peanut stash, the pachyderm reported to Skipper as Kowalski took his diligent notes.

“I’ve been collecting them in this wall, right here, and suddenly they are all missing! I kept a low profile, too, only telling my closest friends and a few random strangers.” 

“A few random strangers?” Kowalski pressed Burt for more info as Jo sidled up next to him, knowing the drill by now. “Could you describe what these strangers looked like?”

“Yeah, one had a great big nose and a really furry tail. The kind of eyes you never forget…” Burt recounted, as the scene faded to slightly later.

Jo had sketched out two profiles that matched Marlene and Fred. As the penguins looked at the composite images, Skipper divided the team into groups for recon.

“Private, Rico, Kowalski - you all interrogate Fred. Joe, you’re coming with me to question Marlene.” Jo saluted as the others did, until Private brought forward new information.

“Jo and I were with Marlene this morning!”

“That does give the otter an alibi. It would be highly unlikely for her to have managed a peanut based heist under these circumstances.” Kowalski backed up the Corporal’s intel.

“Tater tots and tartar!” Skipper put a flipper to his nonexistent chin. “In that case, everyone bring your A game to siphon what we can from that suspicious squirrel Fred.”

“Did I hear _A game_?” Julien came forth from the small crowd of animals that had accumulated since Burt was distressed. “If there are any games to be played then I would like to join and win.”

“Ringtail!” The penguin leader came to stand toe-to-toe with the lemur, pointing a flipper up at him. “This is no game.”

“You are just saying this to avoid losing.” King Julien teased Skipper, “Just like with capturing of the flag, you know we lemurs will win.”

Skipper boiled over, again, at the mammal’s antics. After his yell was out of his system, he took them up on that offer. “Alright Ringtail, we will get those peanuts back before you can say butter!”

“Butter.” Julien smirked, waggling his eyebrows dramatically.

The rest of the penguins exchanged looks behind Skipper, before he corrected the lemur.

“That was a figure of speech, man!” Pinching the bridge of his beak for a second, he laid out the real terms of this impromptu competition. “Whoever gets those peanuts back to Burt’s habitat first, wins.”

“Whomever.” Kowalski corrected, causing the others to look back at him. He was about to defend his correction, when he pointed ahead, “Egads! The lemurs are already over the wall!”

“Fruits and loops, men!” Skipper started directing them forward with his flipper. “Move out! Find that squirrel! _Operation: Missing Nuts_ is a go!”

Private giggled, before whimpering at Skipper’s glare and joining the others in a slide formation.

After many missions had taken a turn to the squirrels’ neighborhood, they all knew the most precise route to Fred’s tree home. It also helped that there was now a groove in the grass caused by their gliding.

“What would a penguin have to do with peanuts?” Fred questioned. “I guess both start with the letter P but that’s not…”

“We don’t need the peanuts.” Kowalski grew tired of the nincompoop. “We are on a mission to get these nuts back to the elephant _whom_ they belong to.”

“Then Iguess you do need the peanuts.” Fred scratched the side of his face. 

There was a lingering pause as the birds anticipated Fred to do or say something else. Fred noticed they were still there, and continued.

“It’s too bad the lemurs needed them first.”

The birds turned to see Julien riding on a pile of the bags and bags of peanuts, and as he waved to them from a distance Skipper got down on his knees dramatically.

“Julien!” He yelled loud enough to move the earth out of its axis by a negligible margin.

Kowalski quickly calculated a new plan to retrieve the nuts and finish the mission, alerting his Captain. 

“Skipper, we may be able to use the wall as a way to apprehend the lemur peanut cart. If we time it right we-” The leader put a flipper up, lowering his head and shaking it slightly with a solemn reply.

“No, Kowalski.” He got up, making a stand to be the better man. “Thelemurs won this fair and square. We are not the thieves here.”

The penguins waddled their way back, making it just in time to help Burt find a new stash for his rare legume collection. When it was all over, the team was halted by a certain King of the lemurs.

“Oh penguins~” He put his paws together as he stood in front of them. “Due to my glorious winning, I am throwing an all-night boogie fiesta!”

Jo’s obscured ear holes pricked up, as an overwhelming lack of response from any of the others caused Julien to unnecessarily spell it out for everyone.

“Because you silly penguins _are_ part of the reason I won, this means you _are_ all invited.” He smiled, bestowing his highest honor to the birds.

“Not interested.” Skipper could be amicable when it was a mission accomplished fair and square, but he saw this party as nothing more than a way for that striped fiend to rub it in.

“Then roost on it, and become interested.” Julien was in too good of a mood for that stern bird to cause him any grief. “Come Maurice, we have a lot of boogieing to attend to before the party!”

Their long-tailed neighbors left, heading back to the habitat with the giant bouncy castle… which certainly did look like fun. Skipper turned to address his men, snapping Jo out of it.

“If Julien thinks any of us are going he’s even crazier than I thought.” The bird wobbled his head from side to side to emphasize his point. “Come, men, we have to file this mission back at HQ.”

The two highest ranks followed Skipper, before Private nudged Jo worriedly. With a little nod, she fell in line and joined the team on their short trip back to Headquarters.

It was rather dull to go over the notes from the failed mission. That is, until Kowalski had some sort of epiphany that caused a squeal of scientific delight before the scientist scuttled off into his lab.

Not wanting to disturb him on a research spree, Skipper allowed for down time to recoup before promising more intense training this evening to make up for the incompetence exhibited this morning.

With a shrug, Rico was satisfied to have some alone time with his girl, and Private scrapbooked a few doodles he had made, sealing them in a handmade journal.

Jo gazed out of the periscope, seeing some beautiful trees swaying in the wind, as well as enjoying the various designs of habitats. Upon seeing the lemurs bounding sky high, leaping to the distant beat, she wished to soar.

“See anything?” Skipper sipped his coffee, but as the rookie jumped he was startled enough to spill some on his slick feathers.

“Oh!” Jo immediately reached out to wipe the coffee off her leader. “Sorry Sir, it was an accident!”

“Hot tamales!” Skipper slapped the flipper off of him, not wanting any more attention brought to his spook. “No harm done, but what’s gotten you so high-strung?”

“Just… antsy about the mission. Thought looking at some trees and such would calm me down.” She bluffed, and Skipper raised a feathered brow before she timidly asked a question of her own. “Skipper, Sir… How do you make tough choices?”

“Depends on the weight of consequences for each of the options. Usually, its all about avoiding further regret.” With a solid sip, he took note of the surprised look on the rookie’s face.

Skipper frowned, looking down at his reflection in his mug. “I would do anything to get rid of the regrets that laden me now.” He gave Joe a whap on the back as he continued giving advice for what he assumed was another artist block episode. “If the chance is easy to take, then take the chance.” 

Jo nodded, and very nearly hugged the Captain before he backed away and reminded her that only Private really enjoyed the action. Skipper wrote it off, anyway, as Joe being another naïve enlistee.

As Skipper took her place at the periscope, she carefully creeped inside the lab to get to her studio. On her way, Kowalski motioned with a flipper for her to come over.

“Look at this.” The scientist had been connecting the peanuts to Fred, discerning the reasoning behind such a large scale peanut robbery. “I found this in the grass on our walk back to the zoo.”

With a clink he placed the metal component down on the tabletop, and as Jo inspected it she recalled it’s usage in several of his most notable recent inventions.

“A blade from a blender?” She asked, as the tall bird nodded.

“I have a hunch that these peanuts were stolen in order to be ground down, and compressed to make peanut oil!“

“Peanut oil!” Now it made sense why there were rockets and gas cans on the chart he was working on.

“Such high grade nuts must have caught the attention of a certain _Red Squirrel_.” The moment was made less dramatic by the mention of high grade nuts, but Jo managed to stop her giggle while it was still a smile.

“…Meaning he could use that peanut oil as fuel for weaponry.” She finished bouncing the theory around, and Kowalski compiled the evidence for their records. 

Sure, the Red Squirrel wasn’t that big of a threat since they last saw him in a hovel in the ground, but it never hurt to be careful. Now that the lab was stagnant, Jo cleared her throat to get Kowalski’s attention.

“Yes?” He tapped the new file on the table before turning.

“Do you have anything to offer for ambiguous counsel?” She put her flippers behind her back, trying to remain as professional as possible about a personal matter.

“Always carry the two.” Kowalski knew what the flub up for most of his calculations was. Offering a bit more advice from the top of his head, he added, “If you can’t see something, try turning a light on.”

With that sage advice that definitely had a story behind it, Jo pondered his words in relation to her situation. It didn’t make any sense, and so she went to the bird who was knowledgeable in a different way.

“How do you handle impulsivity?” She asked, watching Rico make a rather lovely ice sculpture depicting dynamite.

“Uhh…” He looked at her. “Just do it.”

“Don’t you worry that something horrible could happen?” Rico shook his head from side to side, before continuing his work on the sculpture. It seemed counterintuitive to give in to every whim, but she supposed that was why Skipper was there to lead the group.

With conflicting advice from Skipper and Rico, and random wisdom from Kowalski, she finally sought out Private as a voice of reason.

“This is about Julien’s party, isn’t it?” The little brit shyly held his flippers together as he questioned her.

“What?” She felt her feathers ruffle a little in embarrassment. “How did you…?”

“I could see the bounce castle in your eyes as you watched him leave.”

Private took a deep sigh, shifting his gaze from the dreary gray flooring, up to her eyes, before he nodded.

“I’ll cover if it means that much to you.” The Corporal had his share of indulgences, and what harm would one night do?

She excitedly bounced, before scooping him into a tight hug with a squeal of giddiness. It could have been mistaken for happiness about a promotion instead of glee from an act of true friendship.

“You’re wonderful, I love you!” Jo exclaimed, before realizing how carried away she had gotten in the midst of their embrace. Backing off a little to witness Private’s wide-eyed expression she quickly gave her proclamation an addendum.

“In the… platonic way.” Patting her own arm she hugged herself for support as the Brit blinked a little.

“Oh, yes, obviously.” He chuckled to ease the tension, and even though it didn’t work, he tapped her arm. “Go on, and take care!”

With a salute to him, she dove up and over the fence, under the dark cover of night towards the disco lights and party music. Private stood on their habitat plateau for another minute, not ready to share the others’ company back in HQ just yet.


	15. I'm Leaving Today

A rush of adrenaline filled Jo while sneaking out of the penguin habitat directly against orders. That feeling of intense panic was replaced by immediate joy and hope before she leaped over the lemur habitat wall and into the grass.

The panicked feeling was back, as the lemurs met her with shocked expressions. It only lasted until Julien came up with a giant dashing smile and a knowing look.

“Are you the only penguin joining us tonight?” The King asked as Jo nodded, a pang of guilt in her chest.

“Yes, Jul-“ She considered that this entire fiesta was already out of line, and adjusted her words, “Yes your majesty…”

“I knew you would~” Julien flicked his tail happily, as Maurice came over.

“Glad you could make it.” The aye-aye hadn’t seen Joe much since the penguins usually avoided interactions, and he had to keep in his own line with King Julien XIII.

“Yay! Pretty penguin party!” Mort came up, looking Jo up and down. The King and his right-hand man looked at the penguin too.

“Sorry ‘bout that.” Maurice cringed a little, still thinking Julien’s crazy idea that Joe was really a woman was way out of hand. Mort, on the other hand, always took their King’s words to heart.

“There’s nothing to apologize for.” Jo smiled, nodding at Maurice before addressing Julien. “You were right.”

“As always.” Julien waggled his brows at Maurice.

“Wait what?” The stocky lackey looked back and forth from his King to Jo.

“What are we waiting for? Let us get to the boogie-woogie at the bombastic boom box!” The ring-tailed lemur alliterated, as Jo followed him up onto the high platform. Maurice took a moment, shrugged, and joined the others up on top.

The scene zoomed out, lowering back into the penguin habitat as Private sat alone, thinking. There was a lot to ponder now, least of which is what kind of alibi to give her, and how to do so with the least amount of truth-stretching. With a little sigh, he sauntered back to open the latch.

The Brit climbed down the ladder, softly, before Skipper stepped away from his position at the periscope. He gave the Corporal a second to compose himself before cornering him with a simple question.

“Where did Joe slip off to?”

“Um, Jo slipped off to… check the lost and found!”

“Didn’t he make a supply run a couple of days ago?”

“Couple _of,_ ” Kowalski interjected. He also flipped through his clipboard to double-check the facts. “Indeed, Jo made a supply run two days ago.”

“ _Regardless…_ ” Skipper drawled out, before peering into Private’s psyche, puffing out to emphasize his authority. “We have training planned this evening. How about we make this a mobile session?”

“A mobile session, Skippah?”

“Hoo-hah!” Skipper chirped, putting his flippers on his hips as Kowalski and Rico prepared for orders. “To the lost and found!”

“No!”

The three looked at the tiny penguin attempting to block the ladder exit.

“Land sakes, Private!” Skipper wasn’t having any moxie tonight. “Fall back, we have work to do.”

With an intense staring contest, Private whimpered, yet again mentally apologizing to Jo. Stepping aside as the others followed the leader up and out the hatch.

At the party, Jo was having the time of her life, dancing like nobody was watching. She appreciated the dance lessons that the penguins had given her, surprisingly. Skipper really had some nice moves… flamenco, river dancing, even ballroom was in his specific skill set. All this dancing was always taught under the rule that it was strictly for combat and recon purposes, evidently.

“Not bad, for a penguin!” Julien tried to show her some dances that would fit the more modern music, instead of leaving her stuck with only moves that were jarringly classical.

Seeing her struggling, the lemur rambunctiously came to dance with her, letting his vibe do the instruction.

The original elite task force was hot on a cold, made up trail to the lost and found. What struck the three higher-ups as odd was the significant lack of light inside the building.

“Forgot my advice already.” Kowalski shook his head. “Should have turned on the light, that makes it easier to find more art supplies.”

Rico regurgitated a flashlight, shining it in the dark window. The scientist expertly picked the lock, knowing the mechanism by heart.

Private stayed outside, lingering as the others completed their futile search. 

The look of absolute disappointment on Skipper’s face as he left the lost and found would haunt the Corporal for the rest of his life. The Captain came forward, trying not to reveal the hitch in his voice.

“ _Where did Joe actually slip off to_?”

The Brit sadly opened his beak to reply, when the answer became obvious as the partygoers took to the bouncy castle. Immediately, the larking lemurs alerted the other penguins as their heads snapped to the flying penguin in the distance.

Skipper glared, his temper overflowing, and as he looked to Private his expression intensified. Kowalski gave the lower rank a disdained look, and Rico felt odd not to be the impulsive penguin this time. Without another word, the pair followed their leader in silence. Private brought up the back as his heart sank to his feet.

“Blast.” Skipper muttered as he slid towards the lemur habitat. All this time, all this time and he had suppressed his gut instinct. Now, it was clear to him that Joe was keen to disobeying orders. The backtalking, the suspicious training, even the sham of looking up to him as the leader had all been a facade to hide something.

“This madness ends now.” He spoke the catchphrase as his feet smacked the concrete atop the high plateau on the other side of the throne. Rico regurgitated a crowbar to stop the boom box.

Jo felt her legs give out at the sight of the four other penguins across the way. Julien let her lean on him, putting an arm around to brace her as he smirked at Skipper.

“Angry at showing up late to the party? Come dance, silly penguins!” Julien smacked the box with his tail, turning the beat on again as he lead Jo in a one-sided dance.

“Stop!” She looked up at the lemur King before he abruptly let her go, unamused.

“You were a lot more fun without those bossy commandos around.” He crossed his arms at the switch in tone during what was supposed to be his celebration of winning party. “What happened to _your majesty_?”

She knew it was all over, and kept her distance from both groups, feeling her Captain’s glare most of all. Skipper really wanted to place the blame on Julien, but at the sound of more orders being disobeyed, he yelled at all of his men.

“Fall back, everyone report back to Headquarters immediately.” With a secondary look towards the standoffish penguin, he asserted, “ _Everyone_.”

The penguins left, somberly yet still full of action, and the lemurs were down to the usual three. Julien was particularly disgruntled as Maurice sadly sighed, knowing this would be taken out on him. To ease the moment, Mort came over to his King.

“Can _I_ have this dance?”

Changing the scene, Skipper spoke the same word as Julien would have replied to his own lackey: no.

“No, Kowalski. We aren’t going to be continuing and moving forward with the planned training for the evening. We need to have a team meeting, _tout suite_!”

Rico had been brute-forcing the podiums and stalls for court marshaling into the center of the room. Jo was petrified, but Skipper stopped the broad bird from bringing out the huge furniture.

“That won’t be necessary, _yet_.” He looked over his shoulder at Rico, as the other backed off and the rest of the men gathered around to the table that Skipper leaned his flippers forward on. “I don’t think I need to tell anyone what the subject of this meeting is.”

“Insubordination,” Kowalski added, just in case anyone did need it to be clarified… but after reading the room he slunked back on the chair.

“It has been made abundantly clear that we are lacking both physically and mentally when it comes to working as a team. Only recently have we stopped bickering between the ranks, but now I see we have been _too lenient_ with the reprimanding of our two rookies.”

Private held his flippers up to either side of his beak in worry, not even taking a chance to glance at Jo. As Skipper continued speaking she felt her feathers start to ruffle out in fear.

“You lied to me.” Skipper felt his heart catch in his throat as he looked at his Corporal. “After all we have been through… and _you._ ” He furrowed his brow into a sour expression toward Joe. “This night marks the start of your rigorous training. More supervision, check-ins, and no more gallivanting off into the other animals' habitats.”

“Marlene?” Rico chocked out her name, causing Skipper to snap towards the Sergeant.

“Not even to visit Marlene.” He was at his limit, and not in the mood for any negotiation of these punishments. “I need to get to the bottom of these insubordinate tendencies. Until then, I’m counting on you two, Rico and Kowalski, to keep your eyes on these two.”

The second and third in command shared a glance across the table from each other, before triangulating their gaze to their superior with a well-timed salute.

Skipper hung his head in reverence, before lifting it to see how late it had gotten. With a hearty breath, he did his best to stand tall, guarding how much it hurt him to see Private sad in his peripheral vision. It looked like everyone had been disheartened by this evening. They needed some words of inspiration to carry on, and so he did his best to say them.

“Let’s sleep on it, and in the A.M. we can get back to work.” He still avoided looking at the others. “This is part of building a strong and trustworthy team. Nobody ever improved without making mistakes.”

It hit him, while the rest of the penguins filed into the bunks, that he had indeed given the rookie advice for his night of debauchery. What if that made the upcoming punishments too harsh? No, he had to keep order and this was for the best...

Kowalski, too, mulled over the inspiring words as if his Captain was a man of science. Mistakes were necessary, and he would be there for those who looked up to him to help them through these minor setbacks.

Rico, closing his eyes, knew it was part of Skipper’s wish to train him to be a better leader. This new task to keep watch over Private and Jo would be difficult, but it warmed his heart that his commander thought he had the self-control to do so.

Private sighed as he placed his Lunacorn as a little guard from the darkness at the edge of the bunk. The penguin felt gray clouds roll in his mind. A sleep full of turmoil, nightmares, and sorrow awaited him as he blamed himself for all the conspiracy and fallout from the lies he had told and secrets kept close.

Already having issues sleeping normally, tonight Jo knew her broken heart would keep her awake forever. Those fleeting thoughts that repeated how she had hurt the team kept cycling in her head. She had caused a rift between Skipper and Private, and after all the little British penguin had told her, this was an unforgivable offense.

She didn’t belong here. Never did. The gravitas of the situation created since the mysterious arrival and months of living there dawned on her, as she snuck out of bed for the last time to make her way to the lab.

This time, with assurance no nightlight had been disturbed.


	16. Rings a Bell

A new kind of adrenaline rush awaited Jo in the lab. This had all gotten way out of hand, and the repercussions started flooding her mind. It had been so long since her arrival, but as she started sorting through her slightly unkempt studio space, she noticed just how much time had already passed.

Following the trail of artwork up to the ceiling, Kowalski’s words of caution about the structural integrity of the new room rang true. A formidable crack had been making a line from the doorway to the edge of the wall.

Just like the situation she found herself in, waiting for the weight of the unknown to come crashing down on everything that had been made.

None of this material actually belonged to her. So, what she decided to do was sort out the art supplies and label them to go to Maurice, even though the newer supplies were from the lost and found.

Then, with a bit of meditative contemplation, she resolved to finish one last round of edits for the scientist. Of course, he always had something else to change, but she wondered how necessary her schematics really were.

After that, she waddled over to the lab, trying to find a safe spot for the final draft. Spotting a rotating chalkboard in the corner, she went to flip it to the blank side to post the blueprint.

What she found on the other side was anything but a blank surface.

Instead, there were countless images, and plenty of string all lined up to a copy of her portrait. They had been keeping tabs on her whereabouts, friends, and productivity. From the crude doodles of the ostracized fifth penguin, she could see how long they were trying to figure out if she was an undercover agent, intel collector for the Red Squirrel, or vampire zombie. 

That last one may have been a smeared doodle if someone rested a flipper on the board, but it still hurt to see.

She almost cried out, but instead, she just sat there on the floor, looking at her flippers as they became ambiguous black fins while her sight focused on the conspiracy corkboard those she held close had made.

Instead of letting her heart sink from her gut to her knees, or even to her feet, she got up and looked around the lab for the filing cabinet and Kowalski’s clipboard. Taking out her file, and sitting at her desk, she resolved to correct the information by making a new document. As expected, all of their information was full of discrepancies from the start.

The very first one to remedy was adding a female symbol at the top, and her real name next to it. When it came to species, she hesitated. For whatever reason, she didn’t immediately write penguin. She shook it off, filling in the word as if they had it correct the first time.

With so many daily duties and how welcome the others had made her feel, it had been all too easy to become complacent. What had been written offas nerves, sleep deprivation caused by being in a new place, or her naive approach to commando operations… now shed light on a shadow that had been forming all along.

Sitting in her chair, she felt her feathers ruffle out in fear as a small panic surged up from the ground. The penguins she saw as allies had been watching closely for any mistake, and seeing the conspiracy created out of her peripheral vision caused a major shudder. 

Folding the half-finished file up, she shook her head. Finding it hard to collect any thoughts, she tried to think of where she would belong. An image came to mind, of a lofty view of a landscape, with trees along the buildings. A view from slightly above central park.

There she would go and think of what she was forgetting. She must have had others who cared for her, and a gnawing feeling someone would be worried sick after so long.

An empty chair next to her desk where Private liked to sit clued her back into the fact she couldn’t forget the true hospitality the quartet had shown her. Moon-cat levels of hospitality, indeed.

Taking out a piece of Kowalski’s paper, she ruled lines onto it to make a letter to the group.

Dear Penguins,

By the time you read this letter, I will be on my way to find a place where I can figure out a new purpose. After finding the collection of evidence on me, I no longer feel comfortable living here and wanted to set the record straight.

I am not stealing from you, physically or mentally. I am no spy, and the only secrets I kept were to a selfish means trying to fit into such a macho and manly group. Now, it is clear I wouldn’t have belonged here either way.

There is still a lot I am trying to figure out in life, least of which is what my purpose is. Sure, I’m an artist and can fight too, but I want to help others like each of you do. Please, do not track me down.

I won’t be able to thank you all enough for what you’ve each taught me, and I’ll always be grateful for the accommodations and fond memories you gave to me. Whenever I’m drawing, it’ll be impossible not to remember how much I loved being here with all of you, too.

Best of luck,

Joan

The presumed penguin tried her best to not ruin the paper as she wept. The words were wobbly and nervous like the first drawing she had made in HQ. Clipping the paper back to the scientist’s clipboard and setting it at his table near the conspiracy chart, Jo realized there was nothing left for her to do but leave.

She half expected to see Private in the doorway, catching her out of bed again, ready to talk her out of it… or maybe Kowalski checking on the lab. After all, he did run late-night experiments that had to be looked after. Was it too paranoid to look back on those tests as ways to make sure she wasn’t altering his work or fowling the data?

Sadly, no penguin was there to rescue her from her wish-washed mind.Jo decided to leave sooner rather than later after she imagined a stern, angry Skipper. It was O-one-hundred hours. She was now habitually thinking in military time, and when she slipped out of the lab at this early hour the gentle clack of the door caused a slight stir in the Captain.

With the two officers obscured in darkness, it took a few seconds for Jo’s night vision to come back in order to see if one of them had been awoken. While holding her breath not to make a sound, she was able to think of how they were still just penguins at the end of the day. 

She’d seldom seen their softer sides but certainly wished to. Instead, all of the orders and demeaning tasks had caused her immense distress, painting them in an excessively authoritative light, no matter what stories Private had told her about the two highest ranks.

Once Skipper seemed to turn over on his hard pillow, Jo took a few more moments standing in the darkness to make sure they were all asleep. If anyone woke up now, it would be very creepy, and she would have so much to explain… Her thoughts trailed off again to scenarios she worried would come to fruition.

Backing up, she was hyper-aware of how much her webbed feet slapped on the concrete, and it made her feel out of place again. All she had to do was make it to the tunnel, down to the garage, and out the zoo gates. They had done the same maneuver as a team so many times.

Once the tunnel door was closed, a feeling of guilt plagued her, but she took a running start to slip away on her belly. This was a mistake, as her obscured sight caused her to slam right into the wall. She shook it off, continuing with another running start.

By the time she had left the garage, the sound of both a blaring alarm bell as well as a small cave-in was distant enough to be mistaken for a car alarm in the nearby city streets.

However, for the original four penguins, it was a rude roost awakening.

Each sprung up, making a four penguin defense wheel on the ground with their fighting stances, each facing a different direction. Skipper scanned the surroundings while the red flash illuminated the main room, filling each of them with a sense of dread to anticipate whatever emergency followed.

“Where’s Joe?” Skipper immediately thought of at least seven scenarios that explained the missing penguin and alarm but asked his men on the chance someone had more pertinent intel.

“In the lab?” Private, who had been facing towards the bunks, took note of Jo’s absence but knew that she enjoyed working late in the night and into the morning.

“The studio!” Kowalski gasped, before leaving formation to open the door, Rico quick to join him as the demolitions expert. Flipping the lab switch, the four rushed into the room to see the art studio covered in rubble.

It was silent until a small pebble added to the pile. They all felt their hearts drop before Rico came pushing through to start digging at the mess. Kowalski quickly grabbed one old invention he had been tweaking, his telekinesis helmet, to swiftly lift the rocks away.

“Is she… gone?” Private put his flippers to the sides of his face, unable to move or think about anything but how he could have helped her had he woken up in time. Rico inspected the ground, seats, and now mauled art that had once been pristine on the walls.

“Uh-huh.” The gruff bird didn’t see any sign of a wounded penguin, or any feathers, or other clues that may lead to her location. Kowalski took note of Private trembling and took off the helmet to come offer a flipper in consolation.

“I believe Rico meant Jo _is_ gone. As in, Jo wasn’t in the studio at the time of the collapse.” Kowalski smoothed a flipper down the smaller bird’s head repeatedly to help calm the corporal.

Skipper didn’t want his men to see how devastated the brief idea he had lost another one of his team members had made him. He was a few beats behind the tempo of the story, but as he caught up to the semi-good news Joe wasn’t gone in the _forever_ sense, he questioned Private.

“She?” The commander leered at the three others, and seeing their wide eyes, he wondered if he had indeed misheard the little bird in the thick of grief. However, their follow-up reactions revealed otherwise.

As the leader ignored Kowalski babbling towards an alibi for Private, he noticed a manilla folder file out of place. Opening it out of curiosity, everything became clear, and the scientist stopped rambling.

“Joe… was _Joan_ the whole time?” Skipper held the folder open in the center, and as the other penguins joined him ‘on-screen’ they all looked at the document together.

“Yup.” Rico held up the hair bow Ms. Perky accessory he had given to her, now coated in some dust from the collapse. Their leader took the bow and dusted it slightly so the bright pink was less tarnished.

“And… you all _knew_ the whole time!?” Skipper glanced over the incomplete document, noticing the allergies were faked, too, among other small details. He thought back to a few instances during training that had seemed more awkward in hindsight. How long had the others known?

“Not the whole time… actually.” Private fessed up. “More like, after a couple of days.”

“How did you keep this secret from me?” Skipper furrowed his brows as his other feathers ruffled in animosity. “More importantly, _why_ would you keep this a secret in the first place?”

“Jo, er, Joan didn’t want to be distanced from the Unit further…” Kowalski referred to their discussion of the matter the day he had found out. “She still thinks of you in high regard, probably.”

“Oh, dear. Quite possibly not anymore, of any of us.” Private took notice of the conspiracy board in full view of the lab and started piecing together the puzzle of why she had left.

“That’ll never fly. If Joe-“ Skipper stopped for a moment. “If Joan, if that is her real name, left over this…”

He shook his head, thinking of all the advice he could have offered since hindsight was 2020. With a resolute tone, the lead agent puffed up to prepare for addressing his team, inspecting the hair bow. 

“I’m going out to find her.”


	17. The Penguin Credo

“I’m coming too.” Private piped up, wanting to join his leader in the search.

“No can-do, soldier.” Skipper asserted. “I need to be extremely quick on my webbed toes and implement my expert knowledge without any emotionally compromised or volatile distractions.”

Rico knew immediately this crossed him off the ‘I’m coming too’ list, but Kowalski piped up.

“I would be able to track her easily.” The scientist took note of the odd glances from the others, who always joked that his tracking skill came about due to a certain dolphin, so he added, “As the _main tracker_ of the group.”

“Negatory, this requires tact and careful consideration of words and feelings.” Skipper shook his head, and the scientist nodded, knowing he would probably say something to make things worse. As usual.

“But… what about the penguin credo?” The penguin with the most feelings and consideration felt considerable sadness imagining Skipper going on this mission alone.

“Ah, young Private…” Skipper came forward to touch the bottom of the corporal’s beak to physically help the other chin-up. “I won’t be swimming alone. I’ll be coming back with one of our own.”

“You mean…” The British sounding soul smiled slightly, the thought of his right-hand man—in this case, wo-man—coming home made his heart revert to its original position, back from the depths. Something from the deep, though, still held onto his thoughts. 

“But… What if she doesn’t want to come back?” Private recalled the conversation with Marlene, but after this conspiracy reveal, he wouldn’t blame Jo for leaving for good.

“Don’t worry, we still need to find out the details on the plot hook of her mysterious arrival and missing information.” Skipper nodded at the conspiracy board. Kowalski took notice of the clipboard nearby, then.

“What’s this?” The brainiac swiped it up as the others came to peer over his shoulder at the strange code. Using context clues and the visual set-up of the writing, he concluded what the text was. “Some sort of letter.”

“Did Jo write all that?” Private asked, wondering how she had been able to learn such a complicated skill. Not even Kowalski had learned how to read full sentences yet, and their analyst could only write small shorthand when absolutely necessary, such as to program their speaking bot.

“See? There’s still plenty of mystery to go.” The leader felt a new wind of action fill him, knowing there was more to unravel than met the eye. “You three, take this letter to the chimps for translation. I’m going to find our _lost lassie_.”

Skipper slipped out of the lab, leaving the others to share a look about their leader’s new demeanor towards the missing lowest rank. They had each just started questioning how lenient he had been with them when the flat-headed commander peeped back in to make a statement.

“I’ll also be dealing with all of the secrecy from me individually when I return.” He smiled, knowing this would be a perfect time to include reprimands for the behind the scenes issues he saw while checking his security system. 

Upon seeing that Joan had left through the garage tonight, he had his lead and rushed out the same tunnel. On the left wall, he could see the cartoonish indentation of the escaped bird as she had slapped into the foundation, leaving an impression.

On the other side of the wall, the three others were salvaging supplies from the studio space, carefully, in case of another collapse. It was a silent task and didn’t take too long before Kowalski took the lead as commander in Skipper’s stead.

“Alright, I think that was all we could find.” He grabbed his clipboard again, ready to take the letter to the chimps. “Time to move out for operation: translation.”

Private and Rico seemed to be neutral to Kowalski’s attempts at imitating Skipper’s unquestionable authority and clever operation codenames. The second lieutenant hung his head for a while until the corporal brought up a good point.

“Won’t Mason and Phil be asleep?” He shuddered, knowing most folks don’t like to be disturbed when slumbering.

“Well, yes.” Kowalski tapped the clipboard. “However, this is an emergency, and I believe as long as we make that clear off the bat they should cooperate with us to decode this notice.”

“All-rite, then.” Private nodded, before hopping into a slide after the two tall birds, slipping up and outside of the hatch smoothly. In fact, their route to the higher mammal’s shared habitat was something to behold on a normal day, but due to nerves, Private missed a turn and ended up skidding to a somber roll into a streetlamp.

“Private! What’s wrong?” Kowalski came back, leaving Rico to ramp around and get up to check on the little fellow with the other. Getting up, Private answered with sadness coating his voice and intonations.

“I keep thinking about how friendships always seem to last forever on those bright happy kids shows on the telly.” He rubbed his beak where it hit the post while he spoke. “They never prepare you for what happens when a friendship ends…”

“Oh.” Rico tapped his flippers together, knowing both he and Kowalski were woefully unprepared to deal with such an issue.

“Scientifically speaking, friendship—” Kowalski stopped himself, remembering Private’s disdain at his clinical way of dissecting emotion. The downed bird recognized the intent and got up, patting the temporary leader’s arm with a flipper. Rico grunted as Kowalski tried for a second time to offer solace.

“Friendship will always leave a trace, and even if it seems to end there will always be others to interact with—perhaps start a new friendship.” The bird brain only hoped his words helped more than they hurt. “I have no doubt you’d have no trouble befriending anyone in this world. Or the 811 other worlds and infinite universes.”

Private smiled up at Kowalski, knowing the other meant well, even though he was still thinking in a critical sense instead of from the heart. When Rico, even with his averse nature towards mushy stuff, put a flipper on the shortest penguin’s shoulder… it spoke volumes.

The trio waddled on until they finally slid and dove into the chimps' habitat under the cover of darkness. With their webbed feet smacking nearby, Mason woke up startled, lifting up his sleep mask to address the group.

“I say, what the Dickens is going on here?” His lofty speech slurred slightly as the chimpanzee yawned. Phil, on the other hand, continued being a heavy sleeper.

“Mason!” Private addressed his old friend hurriedly. “We have an emergency and need you to translate a letter immediately!”

“A letter?” The chimp elbowed his partner awake, and in the over-reaction, Phil’s sleep mask popped off as he signed to the others.

“(What’s going on?)” Mason spoke to translate. Kowalski wasted no time in passing the letter to the primates as he explained.

“This letter was written by our… lowest rank. We think Jo may be in trouble, or that there could be clues as to her whereabouts.” His own sense of nervousness at the prospect of losing a teammate came through.

“What? A fifth penguin?” Mason took the letter to hold it up to Phil. “We’ve never even met this thing. Since when was there a new arrival?”

“It’s been about a year at this point,” Private explained. “Jo is our resident artist. Well, at least she was.”

“Yup.” Rico nodded, as Mason raised a brow.

“Is that why you’ve been spending less time with us?” The chimp had noticed Private rarely attending any tea time or chess games recently, but to say it had been a whole year was preposterous.

“What do you mean by that?” Private blinked, as Mason placed a hand on his own head to block a headache.

Phil pointed around their habitat to the various exquisite paintings the other chimp had made, and Private felt awful he hadn’t thought to introduce his friends.

“Well, at some point I would certainly like to meet this artist.” Mason thought of Maurice as a bit distant, and Bert a bit abstract, but wondered what kind of work the penguin had made. Holding the letter to the light for Phil to read it, they began to translate.

“(Dear Penguins… By the time you read this letter, I will be on my way to find a place where I can figure out a new purpose. After finding the collection of evidence on me, I no longer feel comfortable living here, and wanted to set the record straight.)”

At these words, the trio felt guilty for keeping tabs on a friend. After all, Kowalski and Rico both knew they had only kept a close watch on Private for a few weeks before deeming him 95% trustworthy. The other 5% came easily once they got to know him, and even so, it hadn’t taken a whole year.

“(I am not stealing from you, physically or mentally. I am no spy, and the only secrets I kept were to a selfish means trying to fit into such a macho and manly group. Now, it is clear I wouldn’t have belonged here either way.)”

Kowalski put a flipper to his head, patting it as a small scolding motion for his own mind thinking that the lab was always at risk of prying eyes. Maybe he had been reading the wrong signals, and the other really did just want to know more about science. How many quarters needed to be added to the show off jar to account for that miscalculation?

“(There is still a lot I am trying to figure out in life, least of which is what my purpose is. Sure, I’m an artist and can fight too, but I want to help others like each of you do. Please, do not track me down.)”

“I knew it.” Private sadly slumped forward. “She doesn’t want to come back, and it’s all my fault.” Rico came forth to shake his head and Kowalski immediately rebuked that self-accusation.

“It’s not anyone’s fault, really.” He scribbled on his clipboard, finding ways that each penguin was to blame, but ultimately they each had a small part in this whole fiasco. “If anything, there are better ways to _formally_ leave the unit, such as talking to the group instead of slipping away like some selfish jerk.” The scientist himself was sour at the artist, and a bit of old anger came forth before Private’s sadness snapped him out of it.

“She did a lot for you.” The Brit held his face in his flippers. “For all of us.”

Before the trio could get any more caught up in their emotions, Mason interrupted to offer the group some comfort.

“Hold on, there’s still one more bit to translate.” He nodded at Phil to sign the last part again, since the others had begun speaking and diverted him off track in the reading.

“(I won’t be able to thank you all enough for what you’ve each taught me, and I’ll always be grateful for the accommodations and fond memories yougave to me. Whenever I’m drawing, it’ll be impossible not to remember how much I loved being here with all of you, too. Best of luck, Joan.)”

The penguins processed the last paragraph, which was quite bittersweet to hear. Taking a page out of Skipper’s book, it was another long way to say ‘I love you’ but the message came through just the same. Mason carefully rolled up the letter before getting up to join the penguins, speaking from an impartial viewpoint.

“It seems you all did a lot for her, too. Even if it was too hard to say goodbye in person.” He tried to think of why she may have left in such an informal way.

“She still thinks highly of us all…” Kowalski knew it was already hard for the lowest rung to speak up, especially to higher ranks. Doing his absolute best to visualize himself in her position, the idea of facing your esteemed captain and his incredibly good-looking second in command did send a chill down his spine.

“Creee-ack, crrk, Ka-boom.” Rico did his best impression of the studio collapse to illustrate his way of thinking about the situation. Private caught on, nodding as he spoke to agree.

“You’re right, Rico. For being in the studio all the time, none of us noticed the cracks until it was too late. Just like how we should have talked to her in the first place.” This was no time for ‘I told you so,’ but it was Private’s idea to ask directly initially… However, the Brit’s postulation caused the scientist to suggest new orders.

“Well, we do need to clean up the studio supplies and get the rest of the rubble out of the lab.” He would need to ensure the structural integrity of the original rooms of HQ weren’t at risk now, and they each needed something to take their mind off of worrying about Skipper and Jo.

The tallest penguins had started to leave, but Private came up to take the letter back from Mason, offering a hearty thank you as he clutched the memento while leaving the habitat.

“Well…” Mason spoke his aside to Phil. “No wonder those chaps have been so busy. It sounds like they’ve had a wild time of it.”

Phil signed to his partner in agreement, but Mason didn’t feel the need to translate as he thought all the birds had left. Private’s sweet goodbye was soft enough not to startle the groggy pair.

“I’ll be sure to visit soon!” The plump penguin made an informal salute before leaping away from their tree home. Private’s launch transitioned perfectly into Skipper’s own dive, hot on the trail of a missing miss.


	18. No Man's Land

The lonely leader had tasted several of the dew-coated blades of grass for good measure as he followed the trail of disturbed greenery that led from the edge of the paved road beyond the park gates.

It was easy to follow the glittering pathway by the moonlight, even though it did become more difficult as it led him away from the roads full of streetlights and cars still bustling around. There was still no visual on the penguin, and it made him wonder how she was able to get so far ahead so quickly.

Several times he worried the trail would end, especially considering how many expanses of road the park contained. Traveling along a long and straight line, the commander realized Joan was still trying to be stealthy.

Didn’t she know the park was already closed for the night? Skipper then considered that the rookie was attempting to escape without leaving a trace, which he also knew would never happen on his watch.

Jo had slid her way through the park, dodging their usual squirrel path, and heading upwards to try and find a vantage point while putting some distance between herself and the zoo. She found herself at the edge of a lake, Bow bridge mirrored alongside the moon on the pearlescent surface of the water.

Attempting to tell the time, she tried to tilt her flipper up and calculate using the technique her Captain had shown her. It proved very difficult, and she shook her head before trying again. The trial and error stopped the second she heard a voice across the open area of grass to her side.

“You almost had it right.” Skipper put his hands on his hips to address the fleeting fowl.

“Skipper?” She put her flipper down, before turning to square up to the ex-superior. “I thought…”

“You thought just running off would be easier than facing the facts in broad daylight.” He waggled his head, still a little upset about how much of a run-around this night had become.

“No!” Jo furrowed her brow, both the distance and the setting making it easier to stand up against him continuously finishing her thoughts. “You—You’re wrong.”

Skipper could have started another verbal, or even physical, means of opposing her direct flouting of his initial orders… but instead, he waited to hear her out.

“I’m not running off.” She crossed her flippers to hug herself.

“Sliding away, then.” Skipper corrected the verb, even though the meaning stayed the same. Jo turned back to the lake, a rush of shame coming over her.

“Why did you come after me?” Jo watched the water ripple gently from unknown sources of turbulence, like a ghost or the wind. Skipper was starting to waddle her way, the action acting like pacing as he tried to keep his temper in check.

“To give you a reality check.” The cartoon bird’s tone was laced with rage while he chided her selfish actions. “You can’t just leave because you decided to on a whim.”

“It wasn’t on a whim.” She turned her face away as he approached. “I already had so much trouble being cooped up inside the zoo, but knowing none of you really trust me…”

“What with all of the lying and odd behavior.” Skipper grunted before adding, “We assumed those scribbles on Kowalski’s clipboard was a letter from you, but none of us are able to read.”

“You can’t read?” She was sure the scientist had written before, but thinking back it made sense why their mission reports and other information was mostly pictorial. “So… you still don’t know-“

“Oh, I know.” Skipper leaned in, asserting. “Even if I hadn’t seen your edited file, the others filled me in.”

“I tried to tell you but—“

“You were afraid I’d treat you differently.” He put his flippers behind his back as the other penguin looked back at him.

“Wouldn’t you?”

“Look.”Skipper raised a brow as he glanced towards the lake. “Each of us has to carry our own weight for the sake of the team. You’ve already proven that you’re able to, _even though_ you’re a girl.”

Jo recoiled from the puffed-up bird, and he noticed the change in demeanor.

“ _Even though_.” She clued him into the bigger issue. “I’ll never fit into your team because of your degrading and chauvinistic-“

“Woah, now.” Skipper tapped a foot, reeling back at the strong words. “I’m tough on _everybody_.” He shook his head. “Besides, there are always exceptions to the rule. Marlene is a mammal and a woman but I consider her to be a… dear friend of mine”

“I know…” Jo sighed, wondering if it would be a mistake to just swim across the lake now. “Marlene and Private have regaled me with stories of how much they care for you, too.”

“That’s another point. I’ve lost men before, but Private…” Skipper upturned his beak a bit. “Well, he’s heartbroken.”

“Private?” Jo felt her heart fall as she looked up at Skipper. “He knows I’m gone already?”

“We all woke up to blaring alarms and…” The commander thought it might be a bit much to dump the fact the studio is in shambles on the artist at the moment. “Let’s just say those three needed some time to process the information.”

Jo felt horrible at the idea of their sudden awakening. A mental picture of the original four gathered around reading the letter and moving on with new life meaning was much more naïve, but a much sweeter and cleaner of a parting. Now, accounting for the new intel on their reading limitations, she paraphrased the notice.

“I need time too. That’s why I left, to try and make sense of what is going on. Having a strict routine and being cooped up in an uncomfortable situation would only make things worse.” She scanned the trees, bridge, and lake. “I still haven’t found what I’m looking for.”

“We could help you!” Skipper lifted a flipper. “If you had just asked or told us there was an issue—“

“I tried!” She snapped at him. His eyes widened at her moxie, and he returned his flipper to rest behind his back. Realizing it was a bit harsh, she added with a weak tone, “Sir.”

“Joan.” He said her real name, grabbing her attention before reaching out with his flippers to show her the pink bow he’d carried, reminding her of the others once more. “I want you to stay.”

“I didn’t want to leave.” Looking at the interlacing circle motif on the bridge, she then looked at the bow in the commander’s feathery grasp. “Just, on top of everything else, being the only female penguin-“

“You’re not.”

The captain interrupted her again, deciding to confide in her, regardless of classification levels or assumptions of future fowl play. Jo looked up at him with wide eyes.

“I don’t understand… I thought that was just a misunderstanding.“ Skipper connected the dots that led to the true reason his name had come up in the recording the day his leery theory operation began.

“And so it was.” He opened and closed his beak in thought of his next words. It had taken a while for Marlene’s advice to sink in. All of his brutish talk and extra manly proclamations were just part of his overcompensation aimed at conforming to the lead role for the others… “I understand wanting to belong. That’s why I’m trusting you not to mention this classified intel.”

“Even though…?” She was saddened to think that the other three wouldn’t be able to respect their Captain either way. Skipper, on the other flipper, smiled before gently clipping the bow to Jo’s head.

“Even though you’re still the newest member of this unit.” He put his arms behind his back, puffing up as the moonlight shimmered on their oily feathers in silence.

“Isn’t this against code?” Jo recalled the various inspections of feathers, and the rules on keeping all feathers preened to ensure safety during their slick maneuvers.

“Sure.” Skipper nodded. “So is desertion, threatening inventions, psychotic rampages, and discussing deeper meanings in kid’s shows.” He thought of each team member breaking some aspect of their rules in some way or another. “I think you’ll fit right in.”

Jo smiled, before hugging the bird before her. Skipper didn’t pull away this time, finding no need to distance himself from the other. With a few pats given from the commander, she straightened up to share her concerns.

“I’m still worried that people won’t take me seriously during missions in the zoo.” Just being an artist immediately paints a picture of a stereotype for the profession. Whether it was good or bad depended on the stranger’s idea of what kind of art they made, or how easy they thought it was to make it.

“Hmm.” Skipper considered the mystery of the arrival. Since there was no crate or big unboxing, Jo hadn’t gotten the welcome party from all of the zoo habitants. “I’ll arrange a zoo meeting when we get home.”

She felt a pang in her heart at the idea of the HQ being called a home. They had all been amicable, but that bunker had always been considered liminal in her mind. For the Captain, he was worried the other still didn’t wish to return.

“You, are coming back, right?” Skipper knew if Jo didn’t come back now, he may never see her again. Besides, it was all about solving the mystery, of course, and not the idea of the team never being the same again…

“Yes.” She answered, a bit meekly. Jo took one last look at the water under Bow Bridge, before sliding up next to Skipper on the wet grass. She was surprised how grateful she was that he had come to retrieve her, even though she had written otherwise in the letter.

Actually, leaving so suddenly, she had neglected to make a plan. At least now there would be time to compile her thoughts, and a team to help her get to the bottom of this. While skidding across the road, she nudged Skipper in the glide.

“Thank you for snapping me out of it.” She smiled, glancing at the leader when there were fewer upcoming trees to dodge.

“Anytime.” He made a mental note to give Jo a pep talk every once in a while, which reminded him of another way to cheer her up. “I’ll… try to keep the discriminatory commentary on the down-low.”

Maybe not when it came to hippies or mammals, but he would do his best to keep his commentary focused on overall lack of skill instead. The pair waddled back through the zoo gate, opening the garage port as the red morning sky served as a warning. Jo didn’t know how the others felt about her leaving them behind.

“I’m sorry.” She admitted to Skipper.

“Don’t worry, your punishment is in the works.” He closed the garage port before adding, “We’ve all been worried.”

While the two slipped down the tunnel, the trio inside were almost finished cleaning. Kowalski had made a quick idea chart of a way to fix the damaged artwork and supplies, should Jo return.

Rico and Private were carrying out the last sack of rocks when they heard the lab door open. Private dropped his half of the carry immediately, running up to hug Jo tight. Rico was quick to follow, scooping both Private and Jo into an embrace that would be his allotment of mushiness for the year. The two stood back, smiling at Jo’s return.

From between Rico and Private, Kowalski put his board to the side as he walked up between them. After a small pause, he kept walking, coming up to give her a hug too. 

When they had all welcomed her back, Skipper stood back with a soft smile at the reunion. Private was glad to see her wearing the pink hair bow, much more tasteful than the giant one Skipper had donned before. Made him consider wearing his red bow-tie more often.

“Alright men.” The group turned to face their leader. Skipper nodded at Jo, an understanding that ‘men’ and ‘boys’ was being used overall as a neutral term. “It’s been a long night, and we may have a long day ahead of us.”

Anything could happen that requires sudden missions, which is precisely why he had wished to get the training finished the night before, or at least bright and early in the morning. He addressed his team as such.

“Get a bit of shut-eye, and we will wake up at O-four-hundred hours for intensive training.” It was only the start of their reprimands.

Everyone nodded, filing into their bunks. For the most part, everyone slept immediately, barring a bit of nervousness and anxiety left over.


	19. Everything in its Place

By the time it was 0800 on the clock, the penguins started getting up. It was the first time since the ringer of ’65 that Skipper had slept in completely unwillingly.

He dangled his feet off the ledge of his bed, slapping the concrete to wake the other sleeping birds.

“What gives?” The commander knew it would be difficult to wake up after such a night, but it seems their internal need for rest overrode the planned early wake punishment. Kowalski tried to sleepily explain.

“It seems that we all had a slumber stress response to the terror of last night,” Jo recalled the studio collapse, and it was clear that even though they didn’t show it... if harm had come to her they would be devastated.

“I never meant to cause any harm…” She joined the men on the ground, apologizing since she hadn’t gotten the chance to before exhaustion kicked in last night. “I’m so sorry.” Private shook his head, reassuring her.

“You had a lot on your mind…” He poked his flippers together. “Least of which was how you must have felt to be spied on all this time.”

“Well, honestly, I should have expected it.” She rubbed the back of her head, fluffing the bed head of feathers. “Considering how often we spied on other zoo civilians…”

“Oh!” Private slipped the letter out from underneath his pillow. “Speaking of, we never knew you could write so much!”

“Indeed.” Kowalski skimmed the still foreign symbols on the page the corporal held. “How did you learn? How long did it take?” Knowing now it was better to clear up mysteries quickly by directly asking, he posed the two questions to Jo.

“I learned when I was a kid, and I don’t remember how long it took…” Or, for that matter, where. Her mind was racing to keep up, as Private finished thinking himself.

“I didn’t learn that when I was a lad.” He glanced to the others.

“It’s taken me so much effort… just to learn what I know now” Kowalski was ashamed at the lack of intellect, usually always being the most skilled, mentally speaking, of the team.

“Being able to use pictures and art as notes is impressive too.” Jo tried to cheer the scientist up. Not just anyone could remember what they were thinking while making art, let alone after months or years of a case being closed. Yet, the analyst was able to recount the vivid and daring details of each mission in old records.

“Oh, my!” Private considered Mason, thinking back to the artist he neglected to introduce to her. “Jo, another artist wants to meet you!” Remembering Skipper’s punishments on the way, he timidly looked at his commander. “At some point…”

The leader reeled back, assessing the group and his own odd exhaustion. It was his opinion that perhaps one day of rest would be necessary to prevent burnout and for the sake of clearing up any last misconceptions with this new dynamic. Looking from Private’s pleading gaze to the other three, he made new orders.

“It may be in our best interest to make today a sick day.” He kept stern, making sure some work was still getting done. “I want to arrange a zoo meeting for this evening, and we all need a little more time to… process what just happened.”

Everyone was reverent, waiting for direct permission to go do their various tasks. First things first, Skipper had Private make a fresh pot of coffee for the team. Caffeinated and hopeful, the Corporal looked at his Captain.

“Skippah…” Once the leader’s attention was caught, Private tapped the side of his now empty mug. “I’m… sorry that I lied to you. ‘Bout the lost and found… and the other bits before that.” 

“Oh Private…” Skipper had been furious at the time, but now, he understood exactly why his mentee had covered for Jo all this time. “You’re forgiven. Course, I do still need to think of a fair punishment.”

“Right-o.” Private became worried, sighing softly.

While their relationship was in the process of mending, Rico and Kowalski had taken Jo into the lab to inspect the damages. Plastic spoons had been precariously placed along the sides at 45-degree angles in an effort to prevent further collapse.

Jo took one of the mangled sketchbooks to draft an architectural plan with the scientist’s help to provide numbers and necessary weight distribution points. Kowalski took outsomeof the scrap metal from various missions and failed experiments, including the laundry vent he had been trapped in.

When Skipper came back in to approve their construction, he made a point to give other orders to Jo. She wouldn’t be under constant conspiracy, but the fact still remained that there was fishy business about her. Instead of working against each other in secrecy, the team would get to the root of the matter, and solve the mystery together. 

Jo was given a temporary desk in the other corner of the lab. It was much smaller, but it was a place to call her work station, and she was still grateful to be allowed the space. As she sat, sketching to think and trying to remember, Kowalski came up to her and she looked up at him with a worried gaze.

“Sorry! I can go to the main room if I’m in your way…” She started getting up when he put a flipper on the table.

“No, not at all.” He slipped out the clipboard he carried underneath his arm, clanging it on the metal surface of the table as it was set down. “Um. Actually, I wanted to ask you-“

A moment of hesitation and anticipation flooded the room, as one small step for the sake of learning became one giant leap for Kowalski. Jo nodded, waiting for whatever the brainiac needed to say.

“Well, after seeing how much Rico improved with your painting lessons, and… seeing your writing abilities are vastly superior to mine—for now…” It was hard for the self-centered scientist to ask for help, especially from a lower rank, but he did recognize her teaching abilities. “Would you teach me?”

“Teach you?” She was taken aback, “I… really don’t know. It might be too difficult to teach you how to read and write.”

Kowalski saddened, wondering if it was because of their previous arguments and issues. Upon seeing his distress, she gave him a new option.

“I could try.” She smiled, putting her pencil down next to her sketchbook.

“If there is anything you wish to learn about in return, let me know.” He pondered, listing options for her as a force of habit. “Physics, Mathematics, Chemistry…”

“I’ll think on that, too.” For now, she wished to focus on the task at hand but knew the other meant well. She’d set aside time to make some spelling guides and figure out how to go about teaching him. Hopefully, he could put his ego aside long enough to realize you don’t need to know everything in order to offer useful information to anyone.

“Thank you.” He nodded, pulling up a chair to sit next to her, the opposite side of where Private normally would. As he kept watching her sketch views of trees and random ideas, she looked back.

“Do you… need anything else?” He normally only watched her make quick edits to follow his orders.

“No.” He answered, wondering if it was bothersome to her for him to watch the process. Impossible, Private did so all the time, and she never seemed to mind. “Do you mind if I-“

Before the analyst could continue making up for the rift that had never really ever been patched, only ignored briefly, Rico came into the lab with a loud announcement.

“Fish!” The scarred bird held his dual swords, the Japanese chef bandana adorning his feathered forehead.

“Feeding time already?” Kowalski looked past Jo to the door.

“Yup” He pointed at Jo using a sword. She took a look back at Kowalski, sharing a glance.

The dysfunctional duo got up, waddling out to the table as piles of prepared and plated fish waited to be eaten. Rico happily nodded, as Skipper peered at the others through the towering stacks. Private tapped his right chair again, Jo coming to sit next to him as Kowalski slipped into the seat to her right.

Instead of having only tuna on the menu, the scarred bird had whipped up a plan with Skipper and Private to see if she would like any other kinds of seafood. Allergies shouldn’t be faked frivolously, and should there be any indication of such, they had faith in their medic for resuscitation.

There were no observable adverse reactions after the birds had finished their plates. Private was still a bit worried if she did have any allergies.

“Gosh, are you sure everything was fine?” He looked at her empty tray nervously.

“Yeah! Actually, I think I like salmon better than tuna!” She smiled wide, giddy since her tuna-only diet had become stale after so long. Not to mention the mercury levels…

“Then… why did you say you couldn’t eat fish before?” He asked her, doing his best to give the benefit of the doubt, as always.

“Well…” She looked ashamed at the others, who all remembered how upset Skipper had been. “I’d never really tried anything else.”

“That may be a clue.” Kowalski was working to devise new theories with the help of any and all curious information she could provide. “I’ll add it to the new list.”

The clock on the wall opposite Skipper alerted him that it was almost time for the zoo meeting he had arranged for the evening. With a hearty slap on the back, Rico gulped the tableware down as Kowalski went to grab a fresh notepad to clip for taking notes on the discussions and issues of the zoo civilians.

Seeing Rico taking off his chef’s band, Jo sadly reached up to take off her hairbow, when Skipper stopped her.

“Don’t worry.” He smiled, nodding at Rico. “You’ll only _need_ to take that off when the zoo is open, or for stealth missions.”

“It really suits you.” Private nodded, before adding, “Not because it’s pink or anything—jus’ looks nice…”

Rico nodded as well before Skipper motioned for Private and Jo to go out of the base. Following behind them, the penguins slipped into the gift shop that was curiously illuminated this evening. Inside, all of the zoo animals filled the room, including Roy, Bert, Bada, and Bing.

One animal that seemed out of place was not Jo, for once. The penguins looked at the squirrel who was lackadaisically standing near the door. Kowalski rolled his eyes, questioning his presence.

“What is _he_ doing here?” The scientist was upset, but the other penguins didn’t seem to back him up this time. “This meeting is for zoo personnel only.”

“I carried a melon.” Fred reached for the platter of snacks he had brought with him. Even with a penguin’s limited sense of smell, the analyst recognized the artificial cherry scent.

“That appears to be a chocolate-covered cherry platter.”

“Right. By melon I meant cherries.” Fred unwrapped one, biting into it with his buck teeth.

“Stop! Eating excessive amounts of chocolate is deadly for members of your species!” Kowalski was disgraced by the lack of mental capacity Fred exhibited.

“Oh. This chocolate’s not for eating.” Or for rubbing on your skin in order to live forever. Fred cracked one open to hold it as a cup. “It’s just to hold the cherries in place I think.”

Kowalski slammed his head into his clipboard before Skipper tapped his arm and addressed the group.

“I invited Fred.” The scientist looked up to his leader.

“You did? Why!?” He saw no reason for an outsider to be present.

“He was on snack duty, as a return for all of our favors.” Skipper took one of the cherries to enjoy, keeping the other motives a secret. He thought Jo would feel worse being the only outsider, and kept the spotlight off of her to ease that feeling if he could. Plus, the squirrel did owe them, being a small culprit that led to the events of the reveal.

When everyone had been sufficiently appeased by the food, the leader introduced their newest team member.

“Everyone, I’d like you to meet our newest recruit.” Lifting his flipper to gesture to Jo, he continued. “ _She_ is the supervisor of our arts and crafts division, and has been helping us with missions for an entire year.”

He was proud that everyone started clapping and welcoming her. Julien was still upset, which worked out in their favor so he didn’t end up stealing the show. Marlene was also overjoyed, knowing what a struggle that year must have been, and made a mental plan to visit HQ soon.

A polar bear in the corner was about to speak when a ginger ape spoke up first.

“Yeah, welcome to the zoo, gabagoo.” Bing nodded, looking to his gorilla counterpart.

“You birds, good at keeping secrets.” Bada agreed with a nod to Skipper, impressed a year had gone by without seeing a fifth penguin.

“A good skill to have.” Skipper smiled, nudging Jo, Bada’s comment making him realize his men had actually passed the impromptu test of secrecy training by keeping a secret from him for so long. It was the longest they had been tested, willingly or otherwise.

“So this is the artist I translated for.” Mason came up walking with Phil, the meeting dispersing a bit since most of the other civilians had seen the penguins already. “Nice to meet you.”

“Oh!” She recalled what Skipper told her near the lake. Bowing slightly, she continued. “Thank you… I’m sorry for writing so much.”

“Nonsense.” Mason enjoyed reading, actually. “If you ever want to do some painting _en Plein Air,_ I have a spare easel.” He could never do work in that musty blank basement they call a base, especially after his own experience living with the birds.

“That would be wonderful!” Jo smiled happily, glad to meet another artist aside from Maurice or Burt. Private came up, smiling at his friends.

When all was said and done with the meeting, the zoo quieted down for their usual settling time. Tonight, Jo came forward to Skipper as he looked in the full-length mirror, preening before bed.

“Skipper, sir?” She glanced at the clock before looking at him through the mirror. As he turned, he tilted his head.

“Yes?”

“I don’t know if this is the right way to request…” She considered the informal approach but asked anyway. “I just feel that I have more potential to work if my schedule was shifted forward slightly since I normally do take more time to fall asleep.”

Skipper sighed, knowing that the rookie usually snuck into the lab to work, and he wondered if she thought he didn’t notice before. “Alright. As long as you can still get up in case of emergency.” She nodded, watching the others file into the bunks again.

“Thank you, sir!” She saluted, scampering off to the lab, ready to make more art at this late hour. Instead of wasting time attempting to fall asleep, she would be able to get more work done with higher efficiency.

Soon, Private found himself not tired enough to sleep. Knowing Jo was awake and making art, he slipped into the lab to watch her work. Not long after, the pair were surprised by Kowalski. Jo took a gander at the empty counters, revealing no experiments were being monitored.

The bird brain admitted that he was also experiencing insomnia due to the late awakening, and sat in the chair to the artist’s right in order to watch along with Private to her left. In another while, Skipper and Rico both filed into the lab, everyone coming to see what was going on, unable to sleep.

It was helpful, for everyone to brainstorm ideas based on the renderings and sketches. The original four each had unique input that allowed the artist to find connections between objects. Still, by the time everyone got tired enough to sleep, there was barely any lead on the mystery.

Skipper made the ruling to keep at it in downtime, but since the team was needed for other issues, they needed to keep up with their original agenda. With a heartwarming nod to the group and a hug goodnight for Private, the birds went to sleep, ready to continue their routine as scheduled in the A.M.

It was the best night’s sleep they ever had.


	20. All's Well

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Author's Note: This chapter has a slight tonal shift (less humor) and can be viewed as an optional epilogue. I left space for future one-shots and chapters in various time skips, and have ideas on the radar for such episodic inserts in this story. As a writer, this is the first time I have ever written a complete fanfic, and I sincerely hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I loved writing it.

The amber leaves outside were reminiscent of the auburn otter visiting headquarters one crisp fall morning. Skipper had pulled up a chair, listening to her gossip about Ringtail with Jo.

“I still can’t believe he offered to make you an honorary lemur…” Marlene was in awe at the quick turnaround of the King’s emotions. He went from giving Jo the cold shoulder, to forgiving everything on a whim when the plot called for it during a particularly thrilling mission.

“Yeah! He wanted _me_ to take Maurice’s job!” Jo shuddered, knowing that was way too much work, not to mention all the ins and outs the aye-aye had told her about. Skipper put a flipper on the counter, the other on his hip to lean in like in a western.

“You’d think the man would respect his hard-working henchmen.” The leader shook his head. When Private came rushing down the ladder, he got everyone’s attention, wearing his bright red bowtie on off-hours these days.

“There’s a bus full of children just pulling in!” He started pointing out the hatch, and Skipper called for Rico and Kowalski to join them. 

“Alright, team! Back to school season begins. We need to be the _cutest_ and _cuddliest_ we have ever been.” Seeing the penguins lining up to receive orders, Marlene slinked towards the exit with a wave.

“Bye guys, and gal, of course.” She smiled, and as Jo waved goodbye in return, Skipper turned to nod at the otter too, his smile lingering even after she had left. Private and Jo removed their accessories while Kowalski took off his sonar headphones.

With a signal to move out, the birds leaped into action, going up top in the nick of time to cover their base before the children flooded the zoo. It was a lot to take in. The last time school season came around, Jo was stuck doing all of those remedial edits for Kowalski constantly. 

Now, it was the scientist who was working overtime more often in order to keep up with her ordered assignments for reading and writing. She started off with packets to spell words he used more often and had made a chart of the alphabet to post in the lab as a guide.

For now, Jo was content with her place in the team. As the penguins porpoised out of the water, they gave a few high ones to children sticking their hands inside the habitat fence. Their swimming became unanimous as they created a mandala in the still moat.

While it was fun, this was also an exhausting routine. Furthermore, it was a routine made perfect for the sake of entertaining the kids who arrived, not the performance put on for the grand feeding in exchange for fish. It was worthwhile to see the children happy.

The efforts to teach Kowalski were also worthwhile. In the evening, while Jo continued making artwork as needed, the scientist came forth with the laptop he’d been using to practice and do research.

“I found something.” He carried it carefully, placing it on the table before calling a unit meeting in order to play an obscure news clip from a slow news day the month prior.

“This is Chuck Charles with the channel 7 news.” The anchorman stood in front of a pond, where a person seemed to be squatting near the water’s edge. “I’m reporting live from Central Park as we cover the story of an artist gone cuckoo.”

The birds exchanged a shocked glance, before finding themselves unable to look away from the screen. Hearing the reporter speak again, each penguin kept silent.

“What started as a short viral clip dubbed ‘squawking lady of the lake’ has been branded as a year-long social experiment where this artist continues to live among the geese and other waterfowl. With her fully immersed in this role, the illustrator’s sister is here to shed some light on this odd way of winging it.”

“Yeah, I wasn’t worried. Joan has always talked about wanting to see what it would be like to live off the land, so when she started hawking and ran to the park I just assumed this was the new plan.” The woman’s sister accidentally looked at the camera before continuing. “I’ve been helping her out as much as I can, and I have been wondering when she plans to stop…”

“You heard it here folks. Now, here’s Scooter Alvarez with sports.”

Kowalski clicked off Newstube before the next video could auto-play, the click of the computer the only sound made for the next few minutes. The commander looked at the analyst confusedly.

“Are you trying to tell me _that_ was our Joan?” He wondered if he had gotten knocked on the head during one of today’s stunts. Kowalski switched to different tabs, each having various calculations and images as he explained.

“I’ve crunched some numbers and gone down a few rabbit holes while researching this strange occurrence.” He clicked through, using the evidence to back up his speech. “I found evidence of a pilot duo being fired for covering up a safety failure of their cargo bay when shipping a penguin to a zoo in Quebec.”

“ _Canadians_.” Skipper said, squinting as he muttered the name. Kowalski ignored the biased bird.

“The same night, a particularly nasty summer storm had caused a blackout due to an electrical current strong enough to break open the crate containing said penguin, and connecting to the mind of said artist long enough to make the switch. All this, leading back to the penguin landing, freshly mind-swapped, in a fish delivery truck ready to be hauled to the Central Park Zoo.” Kowalski did some quick mental math.

“By my calculations, it was a one in eight-hundred-million chance occurrence.” Skipper, Rico, and Private all stared at Kowalski. Even though he had pulled up google street view to showcase the damages to a nearby apartment, they all thought that was way too far-fetched to fly.

“Wouldn’t you remember being a human?” The leader felt disgusted. “I know I couldn’t forget if I was ever a _mammal_.”

Jo had frozen up, listening to the others as waves of emotions kept her thinking back on every time she had felt awkward in her feathered skin. All this time she chalked it up to struggling to fit in, but now it was clear, and at Skipper’s words she felt ostracized again for the first time in weeks since their heart to heart by the moon-lit lake.

“Actually, being struck by lightning may explain more about why it was so difficult for Jo to fall asleep, and added to her uncoordinated motions we witnessed initially.” Kowalski continued, haughtily raising his beak as he brought up his own accomplishments. “I was able to swap Rico and Roger’s minds with the mere force of a 17-speed kitchen blender.”

Rico nodded, happily recalling how fun it was to trade places with the gator.

“So…” Private poked his flipper tips together. “You’re saying that _lady_ we saw squawking on the news was Joan?”

“Precisely.” Kowalski nodded. “It’s no wonder you took a liking to her so quickly.”

“What do you mean?” The chap questioned. “I’m normally able to put differences aside and be friendly with just about anyone.”

“I mean…” Kowalski held back a smile. “You did suffer several avoidable injuries because of your _infatuation_ with that veterinarian.”

“Wait! That was _nothing_!” Private looked abashed at Kowalski for calling him out now. “Jo, don’t listen to him, he’s just being a- Jo?”

The birds finally took notice of the way the fifth penguin had curled up, unable to process so much stress and sadness all at once. Having all these other emotions dumped on top was the icing on this wretched cake.

“Give her some space.” Skipper said, but Private went up to put a flipper on her back in support.

“She just started fitting in.” The bird looked over his shoulder at the mammal-mocking leader. “The last thing she needs is to feel distanced.”

Skipper wouldn’t admit it, but Private had a point. He did get worked up over his prejudices. At least now they had most, if not all, the pieces of the puzzle figured out.

It took several hours before the artist was able to speak again, choosing to lay in her bunk, processing how much she had been missing. When she finally came back down, the team waited before pressing for more information. 

Instead, they had an early dinner prepped, and with full bellies, they were able to confirm that the apartment window lined up with the semi-aerial view of Central Park that had been sketched before.

Kowalski kicked his planning into high gear, and the officers devised a grand heist in order to re-swap the minds. It would be one of their more difficult operations, but after so many close calls with Dr. Blowhole, The Red Squirrel, Hans, and Destroyers of Worlds, their odds of success were high.

Skipper called a meeting, going over the schedule. They would need to do some recon, track the ins and outs of the target, and figure out a way into the apartment. This was also a good time to double-check and make absolutely sure Kowalski wasn’t wrong this time.

With a draft of a higher grade version of his initial mind-swapping machine, the scientist stressed the fact he had no idea if the extra force would wipe any memories.

“It could replace a day or so of information... or a few years.” He sighed. “I want to be on the safe side but-“

“Even if you do remember us when you swap back, there would be _no point of contact_.” Skipper sternly glared at Jo, making sure the weight of their plan hit home. “I trust you enough now to know you _probably_ won’t say anything to compromise our agency, but after this mission, we will have to be perfect strangers.”

“Indeed.” Kowalski agreed. “I’ve made a form to go over, regarding your dismissal.”

Even though the officers were being professional in their delivery, it was the most somber the base had been since the night she had left before the cave-in. Rico sadly gazed at the light fixture, while Private was particularly gloomy.

“Hey, no need for the doom and gloom.” Skipper patted the table. “We’ll carry on, and this is just another day helping others get to where they… need to be.”

It was rough seeing everyone so mellow, especially with such a stressful mission coming up so soon. This meant Jo was up late, unable to get any shut-eye. This time, it was even hard for her to do any artwork at all since she kept thinking about her flippers with new context.

Right when she needed reassurance the most, she turned to find Private staying up with her again. The new design to the studio allowed for a little more room as the arches supported the ceiling and bowed out into the walls for extra cautionary measures.

The early silence was broken by Private gazing at the smooth pebbles that Jo had saved from the quartz and concrete blend of rubble.

“You know…” He started, Jo stopping the lazy scribbles she attempted. “I wonder if you really do have to leave.”

“Of course I do…” She put her pencil down. “This was always temporary.”

“Maybe you knew it was, but you never told me that.” Private sighed.

“I told you how uncomfortable this place is.” Jo tried to keep from getting upset on one of the last few nights she would be here. After all, she couldn’t keep living in the zoo forever and needed to get back to work. “Don’t get me wrong, I love living here but it isn’t where I belong.”

“I know.” The true bird nudged one of the bright stones on the table. “I suppose I may have just hoped you wouldn’t leave. _Y’know_ , that maybe perhaps someday _we_ would have been swell together, in a cozy cottage, somewhere. _Wouldn’t it be loverly_ …” 

“ _Oh_.” She understood now, where such sudden sadness had spawned from. 

“I also know that I’m being selfish.” He shook his head. “Don’t mind me.”

She did, though. It was the first time a hug wouldn’t be the solution to his sorrow.

“You’ll find that cozy cottage, and I’m sure whoever shares it with you will be just as kind and welcoming as you were to me.” Jo smiled, “I would have been gone within a week if you hadn’t been here to care for me.”

Private nodded, smiling before coming in for a big hug. He was able to sleep, after a little longer. Instead of heading right to bed alongside the Corporal, Jo stood on the lower bunks in order to tap Skipper awake.

“Huh? What is it?” He hushed, shocked she had woken him up willingly.

“I need to ask you for a favor.” She backed off, heading back into the studio. When Skipper finally waddled into the room, he seemed slightly upset by the wake-up call.

“Alright, _a favor_ you say?” He held his flippers behind his back.

“Yes.” She slipped a book off of her shelf, holding it carefully as she presented it to the Captain. “I want you to classify my sketchbook. If that’s even possible.”

Skipper smiled. Even after training for so long she still was learning.

“Yes, it _is_ possible.” He came forward. “Then again, wouldn’t you want to take it with you?”

“Take it with me?”

“Unlike the first time when you left unannounced, this time you can prepare. In fact, we can make a plan to get some of these paintings into… your apartment.”

It felt odd to think about her having a whole different life and living quarters.

Now, with the last bit of the plan starting as she packed what art she wished to keep, the others reviewed intel gathered from monitoring the comings and goings of not only the target but the entire apartment building.

The tactical team made their way through the vent shafts, making sure the routine had not changed from what they had collected. After lunch, the target was in position: taking an afternoon nap on the couch.

As Rico and Kowalski unscrewed the vent shaft, they lowered Private down on a harness, just in case there were any mishaps or unseen people he could disarm with immeasurable cuteness.

Skipper led Jo through a lower vent duct, opening it to lead her onto the floor when the coast was clear. Rico followed Kowalski down the suspension that held Private, unharnessing the plump bird before preparing the altered invention.

Of course, it couldn’t be that easy, and just as Skipper had such a thought, Jo’s sister made her second guest appearance with a blank glance at the avian attack team from the hallway. Luckily, she got a notification on her phone and was distracted long enough to give the penguins a means to hide.

After checking on her sleeping sibling, the woman in the hall shrugged, returning to the fresh coffee in the kitchen. When the coast was clear, Kowalski re-set the invention, carefully placing one colander on the human’s head.

“We should be ready.” The scientist called, quietly.

“So it all comes down to this.” Skipper put his flippers on his hips to address the quintet one last time. “A full fic of mystery, suspense, humor, and the occasional tug at the heartstrings.” He considered it one of the hidden instruments he knew how to play.

“Aww.” Rico couldn’t help but feel sad, too. Though he couldn’t stand mushy stuff, he would miss having art lessons and spending time with Jo. She gave him a small hug and attempted to return the hairbow. Rico pushed it back, letting her keep it for good.

“We don’t have much time, but…” Kowalski calibrated the settings before coming up to say goodbye. “I wanted to let you know I will miss… _our discussions_ , and on the off chance you _do_ wind up remembering anything from the past year or so, then I’m sorry for making any part of it abysmal with arguments.”

“Kowalski…” Jo shook her head, smiling before rushing to hug the uptight options man. His wooden goodbye couldn't block all of his emotions, and there was an understanding of his true intention as she replied, “I’ll miss _you_ , too.” 

After a moment, the indentation of her tight embrace reverted to normal as the scientist patted her arm, stepping aside for Skipper to come up.

“Well, it looks like you’re about to get a big promotion.” He promised himself he wouldn’t cry. “I… I’ll keep a lookout for when you visit the zoo. You like nature… and stuff so of course you will, even if you forget… right?”

“I will!” Jo nodded, finding Skipper’s moment of tearful dialogue proof of how much he did trust and accept her in the team. “Last night, I saw that one of the watercolor trays in the lost and found had been mine!” In an instant, the Captain was included in yet another hug. He was glad to know she visited often enough to leave supplies behind by accident.

“We are running out of time!” Kowalski reminded the others of their limited window.

“How much time do we have left?” Private anxiously looked at Kowalski as he held the smaller colander.

“About 12 seconds!” Kowalski kept watching the timer. “11.”

Private ran up to Jo, and she hugged him immediately. While Kowalski kept counting down the time, she focused on hoping not everything she had built during her stay with the penguins would be lost.

“5.” Kowalski’s voice grew hastened, and Private finally pulled back.

“I’ll _always_ remember.” He promised, as Jo gave one final nudge to his shoulder with her beak. 

“Thank you.” She nuzzled him one last time, wishing to remember this lovely moment forever.

With three seconds left, Jo sledded on her belly, the momentum just right to place her under the colander before the mad genius flipped the switch. With a flash, intense pain, and the smell of something burning, the mission came to a conclusion.

“Did it… work?” Private questioned Kowalski, seeing the estranged bird they once knew as Joan slump over, unconscious.

“I believe so.” He collected the invention parts, and the original four started working as a unit, putting their emotions away to get to work moving the random penguin stranger to the stretcher they would use to haul it to a crate to ship back to Quebec.

Then, leaving the small package of paintings and sketchbook in a distant corner of the room, they started heading for the vents. Rico, in a smooth motion, hocked up a flyer for the zoo onto the nightstand in hopes Jo would see it and come back. Little did he know there was already one such flyer there, and another on the bookshelf, along with several tickets in sketchbooks around the room.

Once the mission was fully resolved, they decided as a unit not to go over it in too much detail for the time being. They also decided that the group needed to have a response ready to go in case anyone asked about whatever happened to their recently-welcomed fifth penguin. After that, it was filed away, leaving them to finalize the shipments and give more due time to process the loss.

Kowalski reminded them that their sorrow and memories would fade someday. When this fact only made everyone sadder, the scientist also pointed out that recollection of happy events usually makes them slightly cooler in hindsight. To lighten the mood, he also reminded the unit that it was almost a 99 percent chance she would return to the zoo soon.

The scientist was right. It didn’t take long for Jo to come back to the zoo. In fact, the paintings she had made were being exhibited due to their intense focus on the animals in their habitats, including aspects others rarely saw. With the influx of artists, the commander had made a new protocol, J-0, which served as a way to keep a lookout for artists missing or forgetting their supplies.

Not only that, but Skipper was proud when another news segment covered her decision to make an arts dojo to teach others both art and karate, just like she had with his men.

It was a big promotion after all, going from rookie to leader.

The Captain was also proud of his men for taking the mantle in Jo’s place. Her art studio was still full of creativity, as she left behind enough art materials for Rico and Private to start expressing themselves in their downtime. Eventually, even Kowalski took some pointers from the others about color theory and took up classical restoration as an interest. 

One day, Joan came back, this time without a class that she was teaching. It was sunny, and the penguins could spot her bright pink dress a mile away. The penguins put on their best show yet, and she sketched away with glee, as she would for many years to come.

The portraits she made of them were striking, and their likenesses impeccable.


End file.
